The pipes are frozen,
no heat or water.
The toilet to the brim with **** again.
We'll need two buckets.  
One for the toilet,
And one to ask the neighbors for water.
She used the shovel,
I asked for water.
I always hated the looks I got.
Looks of pity,
and mixed with disdain.
I walk to the kitchen, trash littered.
I look in the fridge,
There is nothing there.
Thank god there was a free meal program.
I would rush to school,
to get there early.
To make sure I got enough to eat.
I feel lucky.
Some kids don't have it.
But I can't forget my ribs showing.
Partly depression.
Partly their drug use.
Food stamps sell for fifty cents per dollar.
I look around and
Notice things are gone.
My room missing things they pawned off for cash.
I was never home.
That did not exist.
Just a house full of people I burdened.
I get back from school,
And the house is dark.
Never know where they go when they are gone.
I go to my room.
And I sit and cry.
Wishing someone would come home to see me.
I wanted a life.
One that was normal.
One where I was not so empty inside.
And under the bed
A razor is tucked.
A lesson learned from watching my sister.
Suicides an option:
Another lesson,
As I watched her overdose on the floor.
Life was empty and...
Was intermingled..
With fear, and anxiety, and sadness.
I would peer across
to the neighbors house.
I wondered what it was like to be them.
Seeing happiness...
I had to suppress
All the heartache and tears I longed to spill.
What could I have done?
Was this punishment?
My wants were so simple but no one cared.
They did not like me.
I reminded them
Of a man whose faults they embellished.
I woke one morning.
I heard noise downstairs.
Most of our items were now all curbside.
We were evicted,
but no one told me.
One day you have a home, then you do not.
Sheriff department
The following spring
Came into our house and emptied it all.
My last memory
Was of the neighbors,
Watching our family, our life on the street.
We left most items.
We took what we could.
We found a ****** house by the train tracks.
The house was condemned,
the landlord cared little.
But...that house is a story for later.
Enduring these things,
Your dreams become simple.
You dream for things people take for granted.
My dream was simple.
It is still simple.
To love, and be loved.  To help those in pain.
When you scale the wall,
Do not hop over.
Turn back, and look down to those outstretched hands.
To those now struggling,
Keep pressing forward.
I know it seems daunting, keep pressing on.
You suffered too much
To not be happy.
Go through the swamp 'til you see the meadow.
It exists, it does.
Beyond the veil
Of pain and agony, joy is waiting.

soft serve
sun baked motel
peeling walls
of pastel painted hell.

tear stains from
a child’s eyes
They laugh and drink
she sleeps and cries

motel pool
the only solace
of the eternal the heat wave.

baking in the Florida sun
day after dull, dreary day.

she views her mother
as a friend
nothing more
no means to an end
no hope in store.

a party rages down the block
she watches from her balcony
thick night air broken by gunshots.

moms drunk & laughing
1:34 am on the clock

she’ll never see
a Christmas tree
with presents stashed beneath
the closest thing she has to Christmas
is the food truck that rolls around
every other week

the closest thing she has to friends
are stuck in the same broken homes
when her moms out partying
and they’re all gone
she finds herself alone

in a dimly lit motel room
TV blaring cartoons
purple and pink light from the sign
“Vacant—2 Beds, 2 Bed Rooms”

she’ll never have her dad
come and kiss her goodnight
she barely remembers him,
a blurry face
mom and him always in a fight

awake mid morning,
weary skies and rain today.

she just wants to go out and play
she dreams of being somewhere else

what it’s like living another life,
on another day

but not today.

sorry darling, not today.

A man with secrets known only to him and God,
he walks along the machair with pride.

He's unbothered by the ghosts of the waves and water
because his destiny lies on the shore's other side.

A brave and bold young man with dreams of a better life,
he's now begun to put this goal in motion.

One more drink at the Rosie Tavern before he goes
to say goodbye to the friends and men he knew so dear

Or maybe one more walk around the neighborhood
to say farewell to the family he held so near.

Come aboard the ship, ye brave and bold young Robert,
for there's a fortune to be made across that western ocean.

You'll be leaving behind memories of that coal burnt town,
but pay no mind to the darkness that'll be falling.

When songs of the old country bring tears to your eyes
think only of your strength; your legacy is calling.

Ye brave and bold Robert, you'll have all the fortunes you can see
Ye brave and bold Robert, you'll break the shackles of poverty.

a masked woman was talking in a murmur and an old man with a distasteful cigar was talking loudly.
the child in the street next to your house was crying and his elder brother was secretly smoking a pipe. her mother had gone to work at the aristocrat’s fancy mansion and her husband had passed away two terribly lonely long years ago. the man who greets you everyday with a cheerful smile yet weary eyes is back to work. polishing shoes for five cents.
the woman who looks at you suspiciously every time you try to peep into her window while walking by her house is buying flowers today.
with the infinite number of people doing infinite number of things, you are in your room, slow music and dead lighting, by the fire when it’s cold and close to the open window when it’s raining, you are counting.
one, two, three.
maybe four or maybe more.
last week the electricity connection got cut because you couldn’t pay the bills on time. yesterday you didn’t receive the newspaper because you can’t afford it anymore. and today’s morning was awful because you woke up with a racing heart as you saw death in your last night’s dream.
you can count eleven. eleven problems.
it is all too much for you to bear.
life is terrible. life is nasty.
you desperately want to give up.
now let us both, you and i, take a walk down the road.
let us look outside your four walls. that woman in the mask was not wearing it out of her own will.
that old man smoking that distasteful cigar lost both, his wife and son in one go. that child in the street next to your house wasn’t crying. he was pleading for food. pleading for life. and a child could only cry. his elder brother secretly smoking a pipe hasn’t learnt to smoke from his dead father or not even from his widowed mother. he’s been pushed into it. he has touched the flame and now, he has found solace in getting burned slowly by the same flame. their mother is a single parent, a worker in that fancy house, her dreams are crushed and responsibilities have levelled up. she yearns for her husband’s love.
that man who polishes your shoes for five cents, greets you with a smile every time you come to him because somewhere, he has falsely accepted that he belongs to a class below yours. there’s nothing more miser and pitiful than that.
that woman who looks at you suspiciously every time you pass by her house doesn’t do so out of hate. she’s scared and hesitant because her childhood abuse haunts her till date. her movements are still controlled by her past’s demon.
and now, let’s resume your counting.
but i think you’d stop doing it yourself.
not one, neither eleven results into anything.
if you’re now going to ask me why she had been buying flowers, let me tell you.
that woman whose past haunts her still, that man whose hands groped her when she was young, that man, her grandfather, died a few days ago. it’s a family ritual, you must know too. putting flowers on the graves of those you’ve lost. to remember them once they’re gone. to cherish the moments you’ve lived with them. she’s going to put flowers there.
but even you know, merely putting flowers on his grave is not going to remind her anything about him.
nothing about the times they’ve lived together because even you know, she’ll never forget. and never cherish.