I beg like a ***
For a token or dime
I spend all of my time
On this lonely street
Freezing to death
While you hoard the heat
And just like the typical
One who drives by
You avoid my eye
So you don’t have to see
The hungry
Me
There’s thousands of bums on the street
And you can’t give them all a thing to eat
Least of all

Me

got all these voices in my head
and monsters in my bed
and memories of words and things
i can't recall i said

The gift of absence
Against my will
Probably healthy
But torture, still

I feel the effect
Of your neglect
But that’s something you’ll never see
When you don’t ever look at me

It was something that was meant to be
You being you, and I being me
Supposed to be temporary
But lingering
Relentlessly

I have no purpose any more.
I’m a painter who’s gone blind
And a singer who’s gone deaf.
There is no call for what I sell.

I still daub colors on a board
To smell the Linseed Oil again
I hear the music in my head
And mouth the words in silence.

There is no surgery or cure,
What’s gone is lost forever.
And I must find a way to live
In silent darkness, if I can.
              ljm