Reverie of a Gangster

We had anecdotal tales to tattle of bruising battles And through them tell of injuries we felt Litanies lamenting limited lives sunken in debacles Discarded in the putrid places we dwelt And from that ruin of beginning I salvage naught To explain the internecine wars then Using bottles and stones through the streets we fought Before the cowardly eyes of each citizen. It makes me laugh now, for we had nothing to claim Except the misery of the simmering slums And except for the repercussion’s scars, blend blame With the ointment. We sat on rusty drums Where men spoke of sexual valor like singed fishermen And between each parody of the dry tale Remember us in our opposing villages, blind children Fighting each other over the empty pale. What was it about? Why did we do it? Why did we hate The other without a cause? Why did we Not take our insurrections to the oppressors’ grinning gate And lodge our protest against history? I fought with foes I never knew, and wasted my desire On the garbage garbled up by fires And know the old pain when I see new gangs aspire Towards the quicksand and funeral pyres.