Why do phone and cables companies leave their cables behind, and what to do about it?
Downed wires are downed wires! STAY THE HELL AWAY
You are talking about a wire which comes down from the pole and comes near the ground.   That is a &quot;Downed Wire&quot;.  They are dangerous as all getout, because they can have live voltage on them.
You should not even be close enough to tell if they are cable TV vs phone wire!  STAY AWAY - STAY ALIVE.
Even if they were telecomm, you have no idea what they are attached to (or what they got tangled up in) on the other end. Technology changes are obliging phone and cable companies to fit powered equipment on the poletop, and having to take whatever power is available there, be it 240V, 277V or 2400V.
I do work on overhead lines from buckets and towers.  The golden rule of not getting dead doing that is that the bucket/tower lives in &quot;poletop world&quot;, and that vs ground world is matter vs antimatter.  Nothing ever, ever is allowed to drape or be let down from &quot;poletop world&quot; to &quot;ground world&quot;.
Call the power company and report a downed line
Pardon the sarcasm, but it illustrates the point: &quot;Before you call us, step really close to the wire and see if it's phone line or coax&quot; said no power company employee, ever.  That would be a deranged thing to tell the public, because sooner or later one would turn out to be energized.
The PoCo will come out and deal with it, with extreme prejudice.
If it is indeed a telecomm line, they will remind the telecomm company of the terms and conditions of their lease of space on the pole.   And maybe send them a bill for the service call.  So, profit center for the PoCo lol.