Hope/for/a/Home/Less/Cold

you sit on the same corner, everyday
tattered clothes, worn shoes
hair dreaded, not by choice, but by necessity
and selfishly,
I am torn
between acknowledging you with a smile
knowing I have no cash
or persist, head down rushing past.

Then I start to notice,
some mornings you don't even bother to look for the acknowledgment
because its hot
and you have no shower
you're hungry
and you have neither money, nor food

just a cardboard box, and blanket
for which you are grateful
because they are to you
both pillow and bed

Sunday afternoons
Feed the children ads come on the television
a man with a great white beard says,
"for just 30 cents a day,
you can give little *insert ethnic-sounding name here* a future"

and I think of you.
why doesn't anyone make a commercial about you?
why doesn't anyone want to give you
a hope and a future?
are we running low on white bearded men
or do "people like you" not exist?

no, not in America.
There's no poverty in America
that isn't the fault of the impoverished.
Thus, undeserving of assistance

and suddenly, I understand the resistance
I now understand
why you no longer care for acknowledgement
from a world that doesn't care to acknowledge you.
and I am no longer torn,
I am disgusted
and I am sad.

I smiled at you this morning,
as you held your empty Starbucks cup
hoping for enough to buy breakfast.
You didn't notice me.
I walked past, again
but remembering I had cash
I ran back, and put some in your cup.

I know it's not enough to change your life
but I wanted you to know,
even if there are no Sunday commercials to remind me of your existence
I do see you
and I do care.

the truth about chocolate bunnies...

he emerges
to applause
women faint in the front row
he is
like a chocolate Easter bunny
magnificent upon first sight,
but so hollow on the inside.
But he is the pride
of our country
everyone wants to be famous
even more than they want to be rich.
no one wants to be educated anymore.
Guess that's why we obsess about Hollywood anything
as our school system rots to the core
the rich, continue to acquire wealth
and the poor choose between food and health care

...and nobody cares

nobody reads
nobody listens
yet everyone has an opinion

and the masses flock to him
servants under his dominion
- his minions

and I sit
with my eyes on the prize
the road, long
the path, rocky
the difference between right and wrong
still so clear to me

but I'm not heard over the crowd
his applause is much too loud
and they refuse to see past him to what really matters.
Sadly, between the truth and chocolate bunnies
they always choose the latter.

I Think My Brain's gone AWOHL

I'm lacking in inspiration
and I keep writing things
I've written before
my barney bag of ideas
is empty like the cookie jar
and I don't know who the thief is
I feel abandoned by my thesis
and my three points have left with it
thus my conclusion is...
nada, nothing, zilch, zip.
so forgive me
for the lack of wit
not for lack of effort
it just is what it is.
So if you see a brain
that has my name
written on the side
tell it
when I find it
and please believe I will
it better have
a really good excuse
and a hundred dollar bill.

All for nothing?

I wanted more than what was in front of me
perhaps I was too ambitious
but success seemed to delicious
to settle,
to stop short
why should I be satisfied with strawberry shortcakes
when I could also try the chocolate torte
the stomach ache, would be so worth it
or so I thought
I forgot about the consequences...

I wanted it all
I never wanted to be at the lesser end
of a comparison again
I knew
I was so much better than
whatever they thought my best could be
I'd suffer to be the best
anything less
was unacceptable

but perhaps,
I sacrificed too much
I traded the happiness I could of had
for temporary pleasures, fads and lusts
and now the only permanence I have
is sadness

I wanted it all
but the truth I found out for myself
you can have your cake and eat it
but when your done, there's nothing left

It might be too late for me
my fate remains to be seen
but I see now, its not about having it all
it's about having all you need.

To my present, future, and disregarder of my past (heartbreaks)...

you're sweet like a krispy kreme

and just as rare

if I was a songwriter

I'd write your song right here

you're better than the best that ever was.

Any person that questions that last statement gets punched square in the nose...

I'm your silly, random, violent, selfless, crazy woman

and your the muse to all my poetry and potential prose

like "the perfect verse over a tight beat"

you might be proof that movie romance is attainable

the way you make me feel: in-explainable

even if I had all the world's alphabets

to make up all the possible words in the universe

I'd have to use them all

and still couldn't compose an accurate verse.

if I were a collectors edition pair of Louboutins

for sure, you'd be the matching purse.

yang,

I'm happy to be your yin

and I jest

but you know

that forever

you're my everything

'course I'll wear your ring

and 'course I'll be your wife

there's no one else with whom I'd share

this crazy thing called life

so I'll take your hand

and kung-fu grip it tight

(so you don't do that stupid swingy thing you were doing

when we went out the other night)

and we'll figure out all that other stuff

married people are supposed to do,

know why??



I'll give you three guesses,

though you should only need one to get it right...

okay, you're taking too long

so I'll just tell you why



it's 'cause I love you.

(no takesy-backsies, double pinky swear,

promise, I'll always be there

even if your feet smell,

or you start losing your hair

know, that with rogaine and odor-eaters

I will be right here)

My Engagement Story, in the style of Shel SIlverstein.

he said
I'm better
than the best thing
since sliced bread.
and that sliced bread is
probably somewhere pissed,
so I need to watch my back
I better take this ring
so he could make sure it was intact
This potential situation
of possible altercation to me seemed pretty wack
I love bread
more than some of the people I know
so I was kinda distraught
but I do eat it a lot
so I guess it had a right to be upset
especially since I came
and apparently stole its shine
but at least it still had its catchphrase
Of course, for my own security
I took the ring
I wasn't really scared
and it was pretty
besides you can be too careful
flour and yeast can be really petty
when they get together for a pity party.
Plus he's an amazing guy
with a hidden, inner gangster
I'm positive he can scare the egg yolk
out of any approaching loaf
or disguised bready bloke...

I know it sounds outlandish
but this is EXACTLY how it happened
his crazy compliment
now has me on guard
from pumpernickel, wheat and white
but he's promised with all his might
to keep me safe from harm
or danger.
not your typical engagement
but surely there's been stranger strangement
than my semi-tall tale
but if I've tried, to no avail
to persuade you to believe otherwise

then you can ask me the real story
next time you see
But I assure you, it won't be nearly as entertaining
and be forewarned, it might make you cry

Listen.

there's a price I paid
to stand here.
ironic, but fittingly
its the price that was paid for me
that saved my life.
More than contemplated suicide -
almost defeated by the weight
of what others thought of me,
of no one being there for me
until I understood
One had stood for me all along.
in my weakness
he made me strong
and I pressed on

and I press on
though sometimes I weary
sometimes my mind
its a scary, scary place
faced only with my fears
I try daily to defeat with prayer
worried that my mustard seed faith
has a crack in the base
and I'm losing it
and my thoughts grow larger
than my heart can hold
than my mind can defend against
I'd never try again,
but I find myself wishing for the end
sometimes.

Sometimes, I'm tired
of fighting
I'm tired
of trying
God only knows
how dark it gets inside the world
that waits for me
between lights out
and slumber
it seems the devil has my number
and he calls at
when I'm at my weakest
and no one sees it
how could they ever see it?

my outsides so shiny bright
my insides rundown with sickness
inadequacy and some kind of disease
how could they ever see?

So I cry in the darkness
and find my game face before I meet the light
I will win
I will go on
I will keep fighting
I will keep trying
because I don't have any other choice.
One day
I'll find my voice
so loud and strong
that all the demons that haunt me
will tremble
and fall back
Until then
I have my words
rhymed confessions of weakness
candid peaks into the bleakness
of my mental battles

I battle on.
and this is my battle cry
Yes, this is my war song

Like a Moth to the Flame...

I wrote my love in a melody
and put my heart in a song,
etched the words in your t-shirt
so you'd wear them on your sleeve.
just in case you didn't want them
you'd HAVE TO take them when you leave.
I'll admit, I deceived myself
I made the mistake most women do
I thought
I would be the one to change you.

I was never disillusioned,
I knew I wasn't your only
but I thought if I worked hard enough
I'd make it happen,
but as I lay here lonely
I think of all the ways I sacrificed
things I knew I shouldn't
How I gave you things I knew you wouldn't
ever give in return

There's no surprise here,
I got burned.
'cause I so loved the warmth of your flame
I forgot your name was fire
and whatever you touch
gets inflamed with desire
until you put them out,
a pile of ashes.

sometimes the memory rehashes;
some people pretend they don't know the ending
before they start,
but I'm not so disillusioned; I know.
Trying to capture yours,
I broke my own heart.

MYinsides

SADNESS, creeps in without reason
and I miss home
I miss the people required to love me
'cause I'm their own
and I miss not being in love
because I don't miss not knowing
if this will all just fall apart
another opportunity for a broken heart -
I'll pass...

the pain might kill me this time.

You ask me how I feel
and I say, "fine"
but inside,
the paranoia is killing me
and I am slowly dying.