Now you see, Now
 
Eyes right!.  Eyes left!  Eyes
forward, arms at rest!  Now
you all see that for every Have,
millions scratch their way up
Topsies,  'home'  a  shack, a
carton, a shelter.  Across the
tracks, in the gulch,  own fault,
bound to be.  Only talking First
World.  (Third too grim to go.)   
Sure, lucky souls report growing
up poor in a genteel vein.  Seems
those taking care helped them
make light.  Yes, and others,
weak with want, are born under
weights heavy as anvils.   Kind
of poor hollows with hunger, rage,
and undeserved shame.  Half-naked,
rest rags.  No, or forever sliding down
socks.  School no pen,  no paper.  
Fee, you are putting me on. Book
out, computer another joke?
Talk about Stranger Danger.  No
privacy, little water, and it is cold.
Short on soap.  Shiver or melt down,
down, and down.  Feel like grit-gray
ice sculpture or kindling tossed
without thought into fire.  Point,
no point.  Fate washes A through L  
in gutters, M-N-O genie to Rodeo
Drive.  Rest sweep under a bridge
or underpass, or are forced to
dive in dumpsters in cat-or-rat
alleys.  X-Z survive wombs that
are running on Empty or drugged
past caring and pestilent births
only to be shot by 12- and 13-
year-olds conscripted to fight
to the death for no cause, or
worse.   Dismissed!!

(c) Phyllis Jean Green, 2008