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Empty pockets
Spread threadbare,
Growling stomachs
Ached despair.
Ain't no money to see
In this mess of a reverie.
Cold winters kissing me,
Smokey wind upon my door.

If only I had one...

I'd be all set,
Chaufer driving me
To my charming jet.
My honey and I
Would always kiss sweet,
Never having to worry
About what to eat.

If only...
life weren't so grim.
Poverty & cheap thrills
Wearing my spirits thin.
My charcuterie is plastic,
So is my base lifestyle.
I'm dreary eyed with things drastic,
Trying to chase a break for a while.
But my blues are static
And they're charging me up
Just to drive me wild.
Louisa Coller Jan 2019
Your structure was tall like a tree in the night,
yet they shot you down faster than lightning.
I felt myself falling in this deep endless abyss,
while they stand tall above us in this empty place.
Nothing is clear to us.

One by one each payment is erased,
one by one each month is replaced.
the more we look, the more it hurts us,
as we sit here in a confused daydream.

Vulnerable people grasping onto what they can,
it sounds dramatic only when you feel safe.
They say their words represent our feelings,
yet every person I know never felt the same.
I never knew how to feel like them.

One by one each payment is erased,
one by one each month is replaced.
the more we look, the more it hurts us,
as we sit here in a confused daydream.

For you grew in a shell of a place,
I never knew from my experiences.
But, for the place I did know for years,
I feel the colours fade away.
Every hue, every shade.

One by one, each person begins to walk away,
one by one, they make out it’s our fault again.
Yet, instead of fixing what is broken in masses,
we find new ways to paint over it again and again.

For I wonder what becomes of us?
If I’m not enough, will we be enough?
Even then, will they come knocking,
for us to pay their debts?
My pockets are empty.
This poem was written to be sent to Hungry Hill Writing for their 'Poets meet Politics' competition; I have wrote three poems for this competition; The first poem I entered, this is to highlight that it isn't just the United Kingdom being in a Political disaster... America, or the USA, itself, isn't doing much better. Government Shutdown, the workers not getting their pay. It's just a disaster everywhere isn't it?

This is meant to be the worries conveyed from an American and English person in love.
Ivan Brooks Sr Jan 2019
My greatest inspiration is Poverty.
It awakened something in me,
And inspired me to write poetry,
Yet motivated me to chase my dream.

Poverty is the caveat for my hustle.
It rekindled something deep in me,
And Prepared me to embrace the struggle,
And put me ahead of the survivor's game.

Poverty is the iivisible blackhole
That pushes me away from the ghetto
Oh Sonewen.you raised me like a flagpole
You are my Lagos and you are Soweto.

Poverty is the reason I push my children.
For I wish not for any of them to taste,
The regressive nectar from her left hand.
For it will brew in them pain and hate.

IB-POETRY
17/01/2018
#Bassapoet
Poverty is a disease.
Francie Lynch Jan 2019
Earth:   Three trillion trees.
Moon:   No cotton seeds.
Mars:    No face to feed.
Yet billions here seek shade.
There are more trees on earth than the combined number of stars in several galaxies.
Micheal Jan 2019
Sought for by all, truly achieved by few.
So many search for years, decades, some even their entire lifetime to find you.
Despite the ever-growing search party, you’ve remained elusive as ever.
The path leading to you is seemingly never straight.

The “wise” say you’re found within, but in a life of struggle that seems to prove false.
After all, the happenings outside of one’s heart sway the happenings inside.
No game is harder than that of life.
Never is the game of life more difficult when one is dealt a bad hand.
And for every king you draw, life holds an ace.

For some this bad hand is the player’s hand never holding money.
Some scratch and claw living paycheck to paycheck.
  Struggling to evade eviction as they watch the rich pop champagne.
Often times food must be forsaken for shelter, water, and lights.

For others this hand is dealt to them in youth.
The eyes of a child should be filled with hope.
Many of those eyes are filled with tears due to constantly being told their existence is unwanted.
Sometimes their eyes instead of being filled with tears are swelled shut.
Their desire to be loved never being satisfied.

Commonly, this hand is dealt by the hand of a loved one going cold.
Seeing the body of one you cherished lying motionless.
Even though you know you’ll see them again, the pain still lingers for a lifetime.

When given cards like these, the player seldom wins the prize of happiness.
Harry Roberts Jan 2019
It beggars belief little lord on a cloud,
All the lies and deceit like it is allowed,
Molly coddled murderers wrapped in a shroud,
Put on a pedestal they make us proud.

I guess it's a joke but it's lacking humour,
Callous disregard and it grows like a tumour,
Deadheaded buds will never be bloomers,
Head out of sorts they'll send you to the groomers.

You are a worker so work till you bleed,
This country is driven by unbidden greed,
People are dying there are People in need,
Politicians only take it's their mouths that they feed.

We're falling to pieces we're down on our knees,
We'll sit outside parliament while we all freeze,

We won't let you forget because the people remember,

The day a homeless full time worker died of hypothermia outside of Parliament In December.
Harry Roberts - December Deaths
Harry Roberts Dec 2018
It's sad that the unseen are left to wither,
Cold & hungry they're left out to shiver,
Welfare is corrupt & the Government is morally bankrupt,
The system is fixed & not for the people,
Some people are predators propagating evil.

It's bitterly disgusting how people don't care,
It's a joke beyond proportions there's plenty to share,
But if they cannot charge them then assets left spare,
Human misery and the  disproportion is laid bare,
People bogged down in the depths of despair,
There's no accountability like they should stay there.

It's a game for these vultures,
It's just life for the rest,
Stress induced ulcers,
There's a press on our chests,
They sell this as culture,
Where work is the best.

But wages have fallen we're slaves to our debt,
Chemical inebriation just anything to forget,
It's survival of the richest while poverty grows,
A decline in intellect so nobody knows,
A deadline of people living on the breadline
But just read the headlines misinformation shows.
Harry Roberts - Poverty
Taliesin Dec 2018
See them go..
A million suicidal shamblers, staring out
Hatred and beauty and dilated eyes
And long hair punks waiting for a revolution that will save them. United in disunity, calmed by deaths and shocked by wonders of medicine
Cool and collected, lost and dyslexic
They wonder at the halogen lights and stare at extinguished candles
Catching at the edge of their sight a whiff of angel-smoke
How many were cast out and how many ran
To this mecca, this eden, this dying heaven
Filled with the dead? Who knows
They are the ones who wander in daylight through the city square
Swigging red wine and chanting obscene hymns
Naked millennial drag kings of all they survey
living in art deco flats, old factories and empty rooms
they lie awake and listening to the shunting streets outside
and the symphony of buskers on the corner.
They love each other in wild ******
Dancing to rhythms stolen from slave songs
Screaming, bellies full of claret
And brassic basic dysphoric cravings they writhe and fall
And hum against each others’ bodies
Drawing knives along each others’ veins
And hope,
Frozen,
Waiting for the revolution.

That will save them.
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