Who are we?
You only see us if we are on TV
Or in a magazine.
If we live next door
We are likely to be shut out.
We are the outcasts
Of every description.
The haggard ones
The left outs
And the left-overs
Of the American Dream.
We are the flesh children
Who, though born of Nature’s Power
Cannot live without money.
We are the madman and the cherub.
We are the people who wait in line
At Walmart
For food we can afford to buy…
For clothing
That looks exactly like the clothing
That millions of others wear.
We are the Cadillac
Of minds stuck in the mud
Who cannot think beyond
What we’ve been conditioned to believe.
We are flesh children
Born into a world
That someone else owns.
Led by a carrot
To the next dead end job
Or climb up the competition ladder
To what seems better
But seldom is.
We are good children
Doing our best.
Plugging along
Waiting for something better
But only half believing
Or barely that
Really not believing at all.
We are the minions
Chanting and yelling
For our man
To get the ball
Bring it over the line
Or into the net
Though neither small victory
Will benefit us directly
Within our desperate lives.
We are the lovers
Who have failed at love.
We are the children without good family
Who turn to drugs
Slamming needles
Filled with speed, meth, whiz
Into young and tender arms
Swallowing pharmies
At every Friday or Saturday party.
We are the drive by shooters
And the EMT’S.
We are the nurses
Working sixteen hour shifts
To pay the rent.
Who care for our relations
Old and sick
That we don’t or can’t
Care for our selves.
We are the teachers
Who show up in the class-room
Against all better odds
Hoping their work
Will prove useful somehow.
We are the women and the men
Who sleep in door-ways
Or claim a bus stop with vented heat
From under the street
As their home.
We are those who walk by and avert our eyes.
We are the smug middle classes
The arrogant elite
The bitter blacks
The angry Chicanos and Puerto Ricans.
We are the secret homosexuals
The lustful men
The elegant cocaine women
In Hot Tub City.
We are the wanna be’s
We are the millions.
We are the artists
Of music, paint, clay
Of steel, iron and words
Banging at the chimes of time
For some recognition.
We are the writers
Who write mostly trash
Trying to sell, make money
Instead of tying ourselves to a mast
To force the Soul to truly tell
The secret longings
Encased in mortal flesh.
Who are we
Without our T.V.s or
The radio’s constant chatter?
We are the solitary human
Lonesome and afraid of facing
The vast silence of the Self.
Shivering and anxious
At our mortality.
We are the women
Who give live birth
To Bobby and Billy
And teach them to play nicely
Who are later hurt
By the killing and maiming
In God awful wars
That the boys we have nurtured
Have chosen
In spite of our warnings.
We are the corpses of the millions
We are the rotting flesh of other sons
All that is left of hopes and dreams
Yes.
We are the ones who choose to be unkind.
We are the ones who turn a blind eye
To the homeless, the hurting, the lost, the lonely.
We are the ones underneath the full belly
The pie in the sky
Who do not want to admit
That those could be us in another skin.
We could be next.
You will disagree
And say that we are more than this.
We are safe and secure.
Our leaders will do all
And we will follow.
But I say that you and we
Are asleep
That your and my victory
Lives within our next move
Our next breath and choice.
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