Poverty — a short poem

Photo by Chris Chan on Unsplash

wake up

wake up

wake up

see the mirror

a mirror

distorted

impossible to see clearly

poverty is there lurking

the underbelly of society

this mirror reflects

a systematic poverty

lurking

an ugliness that is ignored

constantly ignored

Photo by Muhammad Muzamil on Unsplash

poverty

a grave injustice

it is indentured enslavement.

Photo by Hermes Rivera on Unsplash

it leaves one no choice

but to work

any job

for barely any pay

our society

growing poorer and poorer

while the rich get richer and richer

Photo by Mathieu Stern on Unsplash

and yet the psyche within the system

no matter what station

is caught in

suffering and ignorance

wake up

wake up

wake up

Photo by Brennan Martinez on Unsplash

question this system

do you not understand

that

if we truly loved

our neighbors

our community

then there would be no way

we would let anyone

become destitute or poor

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what kind of society are we

that we enslave

so many in our community

into death work and poverty

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rather than truly

actually, care for one another?

the history of homo sapiens

is about community

sharing connecting helping

where there was no hierarchy

no need for material wealth

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but a community together

living and surviving

there is no need to go back

but a need to move forward

in a different mode

a quiet that listens

a quiet that sees

a quiet that dissolves the distortion

and so the mirror sees clearly

what is

wake up

wake up

wake up

Photo by Joshua Woroniecki on Unsplash

and so here

we see our brothers and sisters

and nature

as not fragmented or divided

Photo by David Marcu on Unsplash

but connected and whole

wake up

wake up

wake up