The Walking Poor Poem by Eric Cockrell

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the walking poor,
from the housing projects,
and the trailer parks...

month to month,
till the checks run out...
food stamp cards,

small items stolen and pawned,
trading pills, or meth for
day to day...

the walking poor,
a multi-colored sea,
lapping at the shore of prosperity

like a bastard dog....
salvation army dressed,
often mission fed,

preyed on by the holy
bent on their salvation!
unemployment lines,

struggling for GED's....
going to school just long enough,
to use the grants to survive!

joined by the elderly,
foreclosed, and beaten.
in chairs, on canes....

not enough for their med's,
not enough money to eat...
and now the factory ghosts,

their lives sold out;
their calloused hands idle,
dangerous with anger....

walking the streets,
staring in the windows
still open.....

with bricks in their minds,
small caliber handguns in their thoughts...
the walking poor....

beating a path
...to the capital!