The Poor Side of Town​

​

Run-down house,
garden of weeds,
rusty Chevy skewed sideways
on the lawn.
Two kids are playing
with a chained-up pit-bull.
Their mother's at the door
screaming, "What are you looking at?"
"Screw you!" I reply.
"I was going to put you in a poem."
Then the father stumbles out,
drunken but apologetic
"Don't take no notice of her,"
he says.
"She once chased Alan Ginsberg
with a broom."
Meanwhile, a couple of artists
drive up, on the lookout
for some gritty source material.
And there's a reporter
on his way, tasked to
"Write an article on how the dirt poor
are enduring the recession."
Someone's taking photographs,
in the drabbest black and white.
Another's writing a book
on the seamier side of town.
A wannabe Woody Guthrie
asks the man
if there's somewhere he can
plug in his guitar.
"Sorry," he replies.
"The utility cut us off, the assholes."
Then a cop drives by,
orders us all to move along.
"Not you lot," he says
to the kids, the parents
and the chained-up dog.