Good luck and a prayer
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HOMELESS
Honor
Open minded
Motivated
Energetic
Light hearted
Educated
Self respect
Self sufficient
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I Am Still Human, after all
©Sarah Elizabeth Rose
Hungry and cold, I am a piece of rejected humanity.
I am bent with the enormity of my pain
My skin is leathered from constant assault by heat and cold;
The leathering occurs both outside and inside
the inside part unseen, where it cannot offend others
All my fears from childhood: Hunger, cold, and being alone,
are realities now / none can know the extent to which I suffer
Reality is far worse than my childhood imaginings.
I am without parents to comfort and protect me.
Frightened of the dark, I tremble at every strange sound.
Things happen here during the nights, which are never spoken of.
Every night is the proving ground for the right to exist one more day.
The morning finds me bent with cold, grief, and pain
In bitterness I write these words praying tomorrow will be better;
Tomorrow I will find a way "home".
A sigh escapes my lips as I am jarred with thoughts of my children,
scattered among relatives now. I can only hope and trust they are safe.
I pray their thoughts of me won't be too harsh.
Will they remember how much I loved them?
Will they remember how we were a real family once?
There was a time I had a job and supported all of us / though barely.
I spent what little money I had for rent and clothes and food.
Last Winter was especially brutal: Coldest I can ever recall.
The winds whipped round and chilled us to the bone till
one by one the children all took sick
My money went for medicine, I did all I could,
But even so, the youngest baby died.
I paid the bills till I was broke and still the winds blew fierce.
When the money ran out I cried, wondering what I should / could do.
Out of love I called the relatives to take my children in
None can know the grief the pain the heavy sorrow of my heart.
Impoverished, I skirt the very brink of humanity itself, but even now
my heart is not without some faint ray of hope.
Sometimes in the early dawn as I'm just waking, and still drowsy,
for the briefest most fleeting moment, I feel a new day dawning
I am still human, after all
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PENSION
©Sarah Elizabeth Rose
On the verge of tears I wait
watching and listening to the rain
as it continues to pelt the window
where I stand
Shivering with cold, and completely alone
I shrink even further
into the damp, musty blanket
I have wrapped around me
Hungrily my fingers poke out
in their never ending search
for tiny crumbs of food
which may have escaped them yesterday
The few people passing by
do not notice me at all
and in my embarrassment
I cannot call out my needs to them
Trembling all over with hunger and cold
I can only wait patiently and hope
that this will be the day
my small check is finally delivered
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The Marketing of the Mattoid Plod
by grom
There was a man
Through no fault of his own,
Travails he was inured.
Tremulant through he was
The day he dusted himself,
Then walked away.
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Untitled
R. M. Martinez
Hobos and freight trains and the homeless you see,
these are the ones that mean a lot to me.
We live down by the river and down by the tracks
and some live in old run down shacks.
We ride them in the summer
we ride them in the fall,
but some day they say we won't ride them at all.
But hobos and freight trains and the homeless you see,
these are the ones that mean a lot to me.
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Political Victim
Frank Hernandez
So far away
so full of pain.
Standing alone
with nothing to gain.
I could have been rich
But I wound up poor
only wanting to be happy
never asking for more.
Welcome to my home
In the streets where I live,
though I don't have much
I'm still willing to give.
I'll give you my kindness
or if you need... a helping hand.
All I ask is a little respect
and that you try to understand.
I am not the bad person
that society says I am.
I am yet another victim
of the Government's polical scam.
So if you happen to pass by
please don't be mean,
for I am much like you
searching for my American Dream.
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The White Cup
Freddy Bosco
1st published in Colorado Quarterly Magazine
The woman in the apartment up front came to see Zero and she brought her vacuum for his floor. She stayed the night. Zero showed her the magic white cup. "This is awesome," she said. "If one has done all this for you, what would a dozen do?" But Zero shushed her. "There is only one," he said." And this is it. It came to me. I'm just going to enjoy it for what it is."
The cup had come to Zero in his despair. He had sat up many nights in his band-aid colored room tracing cracks that ran up the wall. He had sat in his overstuffed chair which was lumpy and sprung. An old plastic-backed tablecloth covered the dusty hills of the chair and Zero had sat with a cup of tea on the arm. More than once, the tablecloth had caused a hot cup to pitch in Zero's lap. One day, having it up to here with his misery, Zero went looking. He wanted to find some thing, one magic something that would stand out.
There it was, behind a football poster, in a thrift shop on the avenue. The cup was pure white bone china, with a graceful handle and a slight pedestal at the bottom of the container. It just about glowed. When Zero got it home, it imparted a marvelous effect. Money came in the mail. Small dogs and children wanted to be near him when he strolled. And the woman in the apartment up front brought her vacuum cleaner.
Zero's floor was covered with a green and white thick shag that was a magnet for dust. It was dust everywhere in Zero's life until the cup came. Just one perfect thing,, to sit and look at, and to think of a royal person offhandedly quaffing fine sherry from it. Zero was transfixed. He knew he could meet royalty now, and quote Spinoza and Keats perfectly. His humped frame began to stand up tall.
With his newfound wealth, Zero acquired many wonderful things. Mornings and afternoons were spent in shopping. One day, putting away a silver tray, he dislodged the cup
and broke it. "No mind," he shrugged. "It had done all I needed from it." The spiral came. The woman in the apartment in front moved away and soon Zero was back to square one, spilling tea on himself. But he was content, having once known one thing, one elegant thing that transformed him.
Copyright 2002 A&H Publishing Corporation. Republished with permission.
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Bridget Reilly's New Book
Bridget Reilly is trying to raise funds to print a hardcopy version of her book about homelessness, Real Life in the Marginal World. Several people have already paid for copies of the book, including Michael Stoops of the National Coalition for the Homeless, Bill Tinker of New Hampshire Homeless, and Virginia Sellner from the Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless. But before these copies can be printed, Bridget needs approximately $300 to pay the printer. The cost of each book is $17.00 including shipping.
A web version of the book already exists. Click Here to view
It will be in paperback form in a few months if people help.
For information about where to send checks, write to Bridget at jmcculloch48@hotmail.com
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Click above to order
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Art by Koala Bear
to see more of Lee Garnier's Art (Koala Bear) go to:
Art From the Streets Gallery
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Art by Earl Janack
to see more of Earl's art go to: Earl's Art Page
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Art by Avery Janack
Avery is the 5 year old son of Earl Janack
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Art by Greg Kiefer
to see more of Greg's art go to: Art From the Streets Gallery
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Art by Jim Weber
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