A dull world.
Lit only by the coins, the bling of the masters.

Every action I do hurts me.
But there's nothing I can do to stop the pain.

I could end my life.
End the torment.

But even if I did that.
It's just bailing out of a battle.

I want to try to survive.
So I can go down with pride.

No matter how many times I am used.
Stripped, cut or burned.

I will get back up again.
I am scarred but still standing.

Everything leaves marks.
I'll make mine battle wounds.

The clip slips from my lips onto the ripped carpet. In the dark kneeling to feel where it fell. Trying out the door but it's locked from outside. The clip was a hope to open as once I tried the trick at home. By now, darkness has engulfed the room, and there is no other escape route. It's quite chilly and too silent as where I am being kept. For almost two hours I am trying to figure out how I got locked here and where am I? Someone must have knocked me out as I am still feeling dizzy. My mobile is dead and my wrist watch seems smashed. As I try to feel around the room, I stumble over someone. I call out but no response. So very hesitantly I check on the pulse. DAMIT!! I am locked up with a dead person? I bang on the door to let me out, but who would hear me? Little do I know, that I am already sold out at a good price. Little do I know, that I am already being shipped to another country. Little do I know, that I am in the middle of the sea. Little do I know, that I am inside a shipping container and not some room. Will I be alive to even see and meet with my coming doom!

©sim

Dia de Muertos in a Parking Lot
23 July 2017

The big trucks roll along the interstates
And bear in their wombs the American soul:
Made-in-China shoes, ‘phones, dolls, cartoon tees
Scented soaps, baseball bats, and hipster hats

And the dead. Disposable merchandise
In the commerce of nations, the subjects
Of learned discourse and bigoted rant
Everyone in America wants to be famous

Coyotes dispose of their human cargo

And

How easy for us to say we didn’t know

You stripped my soul,
Ripped me from my shoes
Where I stood
in innocence.
You extracted my childlike traits,
Treated my body
As your ******* paycheck.

My whole future
Was laid out in front me.
Now you fabricated a dent in it,
One that has shattered me
Forever.
I used to smile,
Be full of life,
Slept at night,
My body never reeked the incessant scent
of the lifeless souls you sold me to.

My heart ached everyday,
I longed for home, where safety was waiting for me.
Everyday I was a raindrop,
Trying to cling onto the window of hope,
But always slipped away.

You don’t understand the pain,
You’re only in it for the hunnits
Please understand,
That my dehumanization is not worthy
For what you gain.

My body became an abstract canvas,
For your ugly pleasures.
Bruised, bloodied, beaten, and battered.
Cuts and aches line my delicate skin,
But to you all my pain is fake.

You slapped my delicate face,
every time I asked for my precious prize of my childhood,
every time clear oceans surged out of my eyes.
“Shut the hell up!” You yelled
As I let out wails of agony.
You stepped all over me
Like I was a used cigarette.
You ignored my shrieking screams,
Actually,
You loved it.

You forced me
To comply with their beastly gratifications,
Only in return for your abundant riches.
You stepped on me,
like I was a *****, grimy, muddy puddle,
over and over
Even so,
I was still considered desirable.

I am NOT your canvas.
I am NOT your paycheck.
I am NOT your plaything.
I am worthy of honor,
worthy of respectful awe and delicacy.

I did not feel the worth of a human being anymore.
I felt ill treated, broken, bent, demeaned.
You stripped my soul, and,
Deprived me of my self respect.
And I will never
Ever
Be the same.

The only thought
That seeps into my mind
At sunrise and the brink of midnight,
Is that
I
Was someone’s *****.

Listen to the pleas of
Children,
their ribbons shriveling up.
Spouses,
their vows rupturing.
Siblings,
their hearts torn apart.
Parents,
Bawling for their sanities,
Waiting to rejoice
With their miraculous bundles of joy—