City Streeks

Mothers cry for their babes,
sent off to wars
on downtown streets, and
beneath expressway bridges
while fat cats claw each other
for a place atop the fence.
Whether starved to death,
or heart attack,
they all look the same
in the city streeked.

Young men hide their faces
for their fathers' shame, when
what we thought were fire escapes
hidden amid the trash cans in
back alleys, were really
corporate ladders --
what goes up must come down.
Their souls were sold
for a dollar in Sri Lanka,
where the labor's cheap, and
so is the quality.
Swirling corporation cloud,
endlessly repeating, and
repeating, and

repeating.

A ripple in the crowd
marks the passage of
the vagabond --
the chaff of
yesterday's wheat.
Nobody wants to touch one
who so sorely needs a hand.
They throw money away on
frivolous confections
while he stands outside the door,
hungry.

 No sense funding a lost cause:
Besides, he'd probably just
spend it on drugs.

That makes me feel better --

Take another bite.

Dallas D'Angelo-Gary 00