Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Pennies of a Nation




I.
GIVE ME
your tired, your poor, your huddled masses
(the disenfranchised, the lost, the scared)
yearning- (desperately seeking, needing)
to breathe
free in the forgotten foggy
barren New York Harbor
she screams, now whispers
Blackness strangles her voice as her torch ignites
and she melts

into Pennies
millions of green pennies
float on polluted waters
struggle to stay afloat
And slowly

they drift beneath the current
drown unnoticed


II.
Once
when I could walk
the streets in peace, wave
to my neighbors
I was a doctor.
They took him, one night
but I wandered the streets
hoping
not to find his body
black houses behind weathered
wood paneled windows
hiding neighbors
gun shots rattle the silent streets
where children once
were children.
Hell is only gun shots that resound in the darkness,
hell is not knowing where he is
hell is knowing who they are
and when he came back to me,
we ran, and we ran
our home was nothing
more than just shelter
from bullets.

Michigan is supposed to be heaven
and I just want to breathe
free with the sun on my face

III.
They are the future, their big
brown eyes full
of wonder and questions
full of thoughts and ideas of happiness
and one day
a Tuesday,
I said good-bye and they left
for school-
And a bomb went off.
The enemy, former friends
or sons of long gone friends blew
up the school of innocent
boys. Plumes of hellish
smoke clawed out
the pale blue sky and covered the sun.

Maybe it was a miracle
they came home to me.
we ran, and we ran
our home was nothing
more than just a shelter
from smoky shrapnel.

Florida is supposed to be heaven
and I just want to breathe
free with the sun on my face

IV.
LIFE LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS

Oh TJ what did you mean?
Who did you mean?

When I penned these
words, I only
meant those
like me, men-
fighting for freedom from the crown
But, I watched this nation
and all nations unfold before my dead eyes
I was wrong. These rights
are meant for everyone
I wish I could tell them all
I wish I could change the world
I wish I could take America
by the hand and show them all I have seen

Some of us
still believe those words
Some of us clamor around
the rotunda in the Archives
just to get a glimpse
of the one parchment
that makes us American.

The ink flakes away and soon
it will be dust, where we will be then?
What will we remember?

V.
United?
We are divided
the right the left the black
the white blaming this blaming that
and the only solutions
are tried and true in high school chem labs

And They Laugh At Us
behind their black masks and black flag
sitting on outdated
Russian and US weapons

And we will destroy
ourselves. Remember Rome
ghostly cheers of a once mighty
nation are silent, the coliseum
continues to crumble in the rain.

Compassion?
(For the meek and mild
and nuns in habits with their crosses,
prayers and food for the needy)

Hatred?
Is Free!
And simple, and easy, and instinctual.

What will our legacy be?

VI.
Pennies wash ashore
on some beach
in Jersey
a young girl plucks one
takes her scarf, wipes the penny clean
then picks up another and another and another
wrapping them in her plaid scarf
warm, safe, free from sand and mud.

Compassion becomes life
liberty comes home
and happiness is to breathe free.


***
If you enjoyed this poem, please share with your friends. It was a poem I wrote for poetry class and I feel that instead of sending it away for publishing, everyone should read it for free because I believe it is important.

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