To think a man weak
Weakens ye
To think a man sick
Sickens ye
To think a man less
lessens ye
the more becomes
what ye think it be

care  when you feel good
or your care will hurt more

Survivors
by Michael R. Burch

(for the victims and survivors of 9/11 and their families)

In truth, we do not feel the horror
of the survivors,
but what passes for horror:

a shiver of “empathy.”

We too are “survivors,”
if to survive is to snap back
from the sight of death

like a turtle retracting its neck.

Published by The HyperTexts, Gostinaya (Russia), Ulita (Russia), Promosaik(Germany), The Night Genre Project and Muddy Chevy; also turned into a YouTube video by Lillian Y. Wong. Keywords: survivors, victims, families, 911, 9/11, terrorist, attack, terrorism, empathy, sympathy, truth, horror, death, survive, survival

You have no sympathy
as rumours flee
Spotlight's on
and facts act accordingly

Simplicity shows less shadow

Is it more just to be
As the price for the free
holds levels of uncertainty
Value your integrity
It is more to be just

Hey there, I'm Joe Sixpack,
an American full of pride.
I don't want no welfare state,
I don't want no free ride.

And I don't want no charity
'cause freedom don't come free.
I just got four priorities,
they're ME, ME, ME and ME!

I just can't stand the government.
Tax, I don't wanna pay.
Don't want no lazy welfare bums
to **** it all away.

Don't want no ******* FEMA
after flood or hurricane.
Don't want no public healthcare
to fix someone else's pain.

But if my house blows over
or if I get unemployed,
and I don't got insurance
and my health's getting destroyed...

Well, then you'll see me change my tune
and I'll be first in line.
Sayin' "I deserve a handout",
"Oh poor ME" I'll ***** and whine.

Have you tasted the bitterness of tears of despair?
Have you watched the sun sink through such pale, balmless air
that your soul sought its shell like a crab on a beach,
then scuttled inside to be safe, out of reach?

Might I lift you tonight from earth’s wreckage and damage
on these waves gently rising to pay the moon homage?
Or better, perhaps, let me say that I, too,
have dreamed of infinity . . . windswept and blue.

This poem about sympathy for someone contemplating suicide was originally published by TC Broadsheet Verses. I was paid a whopping $10, my first cash payment. It was subsequently published by Piedmont Literary Review, Penny Dreadful, the Net Poetry and Art Competition, Songs of Innocence, Poetry Life & Times, Better Than Starbucks and The Chained Muse.