The Homeless. Everyone agrees it’s a problem yet no one has a solution. Many of us would refuse to walk an inch in their shoes but most of them would walk a mile with blistered bare feet just to have a pair of our shoes. They are looked down on, looked at with disgust by many, looked at with sympathy or empathy by others. Most of us walk past them pretending not to see them, or maybe throwing them a bit of spare change, but seldom do any of us stop and talk. Or better yet, listen…..

How did I get here?
Too many the days of pain
Too long the pain of days
Was what brought me to this
Alone in the jaws of depravity
In the confines of hopelessness
Left naked and empty of hand
Crouched in the shadow of despair
Possessing only the gifts of the Earth
And the stipends of the caring few
While the gates in my face are slammed shut
The gates of my heart remain ever open
What little I have I share with the world
But the world doesn’t often reciprocate
Ridiculed and held in distain from on high
I am the dust beneath their Persian rugs
Catching scraps from their linen tablecloths
Judged as lazy, useless, and worthless
Praying the generous winds of humanity
Will lift me away to place I can call home
And free me from this cardboard purgatory

Spit it BeBop Street Flow…..

Listen up to the story of existing in purgatory inside a cardboard dormitory
Where guts ain’t got no glory dying is pretty but livings gory
A metaphoric allegory that ends in a repository
Am I striking a chord here?
My shelter made of cardboard is an upgrade from the psyche ward
Got no money can’t afford more been abandoned by the good lord
My universe yet un explored I was floored
Had to fall on my sword
Guess I got a fitting reward but I hate falls
Want to tear down the corrugated walls
But that takes protocols and balls and my balls are all I got left
Feeling bereft because I turned right when I shoulda turned left
So I turned to theft
I was busted disgusted and couldn’t be trusted so I fled
In days past my life seemed complete, had the world upon my feet
Riding high living sweet a big time player playing Wall Street
Until my defeat
Took quite a fall and lost it all, took both eyes off of the ball
Dropped like a giant cannon ball into a tub of alcohol
Anyhow, that’s all I can recall
Lost my job and lost my home lost my family was all alone
They stripped me to the bone locked me up in the crazy dome
Then set me free
Below the Bourgeoisie
No longer have home so with homeless do I roam
Stockholm syndrome
Misfortune as my captor, my pastor and my master
Lead me straight into disaster faster than a slick Bastard
So I got plastered
To be clear it was wine and beer until my problems became severe
Then I blazed the drug frontier and all my worries disappeared
Acted cavalier
But it gets you in the end destroys your life and all your friends
No matter how hard you pretend all the shit comes back again
Only worse
Life becomes perverse obtuse and terse
You’re immersed you can’t converse the only way out is in a hearse
So you ride alone

How did they end up here on “skid row”? Some are simply born into poverty and never have the advantages of good schooling we take for granted. Illness, loss of a loved one, domestic abuse, mental illness, PTSD. Some came back from fighting a war and were simply left alone in the cold. Some simply couldn’t find work. The point is don’t assume they put themselves there from lack of will, or unwillingness to do even menial tasks. Most homeless humans have stories to share that could curl self righteous hair.

So don’t point a finger and yell that lazy bitch got no will power, that’s all. Pull themselves up by their bootstraps and face the world, get a job instead of getting high. But getting high isn’t why most of them do it, they do it to numb the pain, the physical, the mental, and most of all the emotional. Bad decisions often lead to worse decisions and the dominoes of life continue to fall, a little harder each time. Judge not lest Ye be judged…… Live and Love in Peace