Hurricane fighter
Life and death celebrator, Spicy food eater
Street performer and Harborer of ships
Weather-beaten, resilient, colorful
The City that Care Forgot

They tell me you are beaten, *****, and old, and I acknowledge this, having seen your streets and limping buildings, water-marked and sagging
They tell me you are cruel and dark, and I agree, I've seen the voodoo shops, and the papers speaking of crimes
They tell me you are raucous and crowded, and I respond, "Yes, I know. I have walked through her streets and through the ear shattering sound"

And having said these things, I look again to those who ridicule my home, my city and tell them:
I dare you to bring me news of another place that's been beat down, and yet time after time rises again, singing even in death and anguish, wearing the dingy but bright colors of life

Laughing in the face of defeat, walking proud, and even as its guts tear each other apart, she sets her jaw and keeps moving forward
Fierce as a gator grappling with a hunter, clever and bright as a bird
Battered,
Falling,
Flying,
Soaring,
Hurting, healing, grinning
Beneath the ******, dirt smeared face, she smiles with a brilliant grin
Beneath the harsh reality of injuries and setbacks, fire dances in her heart and soul
Dancing even as a wizened soldier knowledgeable in pain but carefree would
Twisting and spinning over and around obstacles, taking the occasional hit, laughing in the ***** air, lifeblood of the city coursing through her veins
Dancing!
Laughing the weather-beaten, resilient, colorful laugh of Youth. Proud to be a Hurricane fighter
Life and death celebrator, Spicy food eater Street performer, Harborer of ships,
The City that Care Forgot