What It Is
Mornings, at the bus stop,
This one stands scraggly haired, and apart.
Solitary, sour at seven a.m.,
And I think, why not?
Poor thing, you're an American teen
Who has everything.
I'd like to hook my fingers
Through the holes in your jeans,
And plop you down in Kenya,
Where Awiti, just your age, sends one child
To the school that cannot meet
When it rains.
Or we could go to some war-torn land,
Or Haiti's slums...
But really, baby,
Everything is relative.
It is what it is, you stoically say,
Enduring your four bedroom life.
Your hundred dollar jeans
Are as full of misery
As the dust that settles
On the back of the boney cow
Herded through the dirt
By an African child.
