Invisible Lives
I look at the girls or the kid that got away
They took their lives into their hands on the day
Fought a foe
Even though
The odds where stacked
They fought back
Warms my heart for a minute or two
But I think of the man who
Works in the hardware store
See I remember what it feels like to be poor
Even to move to breath cost more
I could barely drag myself off the floor
Kids in school who fall asleep on their books
Staff and kids cast looks
She’s so weak from not enough to eat
The downward spiral too hard to beat
Going all day
Expected to play
Expected to pay
With minimum wage
When you’re diluting your milk
So it’s just chalky water
Something isn’t right
When taxpayers have to pay for lights
In Iraq
When theirs are being turned off at home
Babies left alone
So mom can work
Another job
People lining up for food
Today
Just like in the day
Of Depression
Poverty’s so debilitating hard to get up and go
Simply because you know
That even breathing will begin the cash flow
Hard to move the fear the dread
Occupies every cell of the brain in your head
Wanting is not even a consideration
Needing is allowed in moderation
The gut pull tearing you can feel
Wishing upon the unreal
Lottos sweepstakes contests
Just a hand
A rope
Not to hang
But for you to hang
Onto in the current of debt
Like a torrent swept
Down the stream of the concrete spillway
Thousands under no power of their own
Rush
Thrown
Into a spiraling pull
Down
The groans
Moans
Of despairing
Sharing
Grown
People who mistakes they own
Mistakes they owe
Letters of worth
Out of school
Can’t escape
The D’s and F’s
Of a credit rating
That no one did show
Or maybe they were who knows
Too busy trying to get by
Distracted by apple pie
Or lucy flying in the sky
Or keeping up appearances by
Looking fly
When at home
No drone
From the disconnected refrigeration box
Dirty socks
Stuck in silence
Not a breath of wind
How to convey the utter misery
Isolation that no ching
Brings
But another session
in Congress does say
brighter days
on the way
I have to say
I think we know the way
This turns out
I know it won’t be me getting the clout
I don’t belong to the Skull & Bones
I don’t have a pocket of affluent crones
Rolling me
I remember coveting roommates food
Breaking off pieces hoping they didn’t notice
Taking showers so quick
So cold
No money to pay for warm water
Being hungry
The shame from not being able
To maintain
My own life
Now I see
Families
Waiting all day in line
For hours at a time
For food that’ll last two days or so
Even though
Dad’s got a job
What about the seniors
War vets and all
Waiting for rations
Thanks buddy for all you’ve done
Here’s a crumb
Move on
Doesn’t that just beat it all
To hell?