Recognize the Humanity of the Homeless

For the Love of Everything That is Good

I don’t see homeless people

On street corners as

Pathetic

Lazy

Dangerous

Stains on society

Anymore

I see bodies slumped with exhaustion

Bodies that didn’t fail them

Bodies that were bought and sold

For cheap labor

And benefited from only

A trickle down

I see ill, disabled bodies

Broken down by corrupt

For-profit systems

Bodies who don't have the ability

To afford survival

I see people who were property of

The United States of America

Sent in droves to bleed out

On foreign soil

Sent by leaders driven

By conquest

By greed

By self-righteousness

Wounded warriors

And bleeding purple hearts

Crammed into the dingiest alleyways

On display in the most crowded

Public spaces

For housed civilians

To execute judgement:

Dishonorable

Death sentence

I see the youngest among us

Kids with Pride pins

And trans flags

And gang signs

And bruised eyes

Kids old enough

To be arrested for running away

And returned to broken homes

Or take their chances on the street

I see the most humbled among us

Brave enough to beg

A cold society with colder foot soldiers

To spare them the resources they hoard:

Food

Water

Shelter

Kindness

People stripped of their intrinsic dignity and rights

Because they have nowhere to call home

Modern hunter-gatherers

Nomads without resources

Stranded in this wasteland

While the rich thirst for

The blood of our living labor

And suck us dry

I see the working class:

The majority of Americans scraping by

Paycheck to paycheck

One disaster away

From sleeping on park benches

When I see a homeless person

On a street corner now

Or digging through a bin

I don’t sense danger

Or wrinkle my nose in disgust

I see myself

I see kind, downcast eyes

Set in leathered, sun-weathered skin

The best of our species’

Resilience, resourcefulness, and adaptability

The humanity that we teach

But don’t appreciate in practice

Living, breathing beings who are still here

Despite all odds and attempts to eradicate them

And assassinate their characters

The poorest of the poor

Yet they persist

They continue to exist

Yet we persist

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