Indigence Poems

All In a Day's Calling

First, settle your differences 
    with those whom you love
  Pay any debts you owe
    down here or above

  Greet everyone you see
    with a cheerful 'How-do'
  and a smile from your heart
    that's 'genuine you'

  Make sure to call those
    who live far away
  who've grown remote, but
    helped you 'back in the day'

  Give a few bucks
    to the homeless you see
  Pray to God their souls
    from indigence be free

  Don't neglect to remove trash
    that bars people's way
  If you don't do it now
    it won't get done today

  Then when you're so tired
    you need to nap for an hour
  Pray your heart out to God
    Ask Him for more power ...

The Rudiments of Wings

Nurtured by love and parents’ guidance, 
Grown under the canopy of God’s wisdom;
Midst material deprivation and indigence,
He spread his wings far for an ambition.

Hugging each day’s sunshine, rains and storms,
With all fervor prayers flapping fast to heaven;
By his unwavering sacrifices and determinations,
Finally got his star… settled down all at haven.


Feb. 24,2022   2:50pm





This or That, Vol 10
Contest Judged:  3/2/2022 2:27:00 PM
Sponsored by: Edward Ibeh
Place 3

Poverty To Prosperity

POVERTY
penurious, needy
beggaring, needing, suffering
destitution, indigence; affluence, riches
well-being, succeeding, thriving
successful, robust
PROSPERITY

written January 17, 2022

Old Delhi

a mass of wires criss-crossed the sky
and hung across the road
as car horns - stuck on 'play repeat'
blared out where tourists strode.

there were happy, smiling faces
advertising private care
but beneath those giant hoardings
lay indigence everywhere.

we were watching 'non-stop TV'
through the window of our bus
but we couldn't change the channel
as Old Delhi streamed past us.

then our tour guide switched the picture
to a world of corporate smiles
and our hotel was all marble
and the lobby stretched for miles.

The Dream Versus the Future

Chorus:
When he  built a dream house and
"The dream" became a nightmare.
Then, he spoke to us about his frustration, 
how his aims had not been achieved.
He entrusted himself to us.

Man. Do not dream, instead Act!

The Man:
Then I myself set out, 
and loitering is also forbidden,
And I, who stood intent upon beholding the roots of Fortune!
I tried it; I swear it! 
I tried with all my strength!
but...I failed again
but... So far; I definitely understood.
that what I intended
that. hardly could the eye attain it.

The Chorus:
Cord never shot an arrow from itself,
for that you need a bowman
but also, permission to wander.

The Man:
And I, in my indigence unveiled The Quiz.
Humbly and forever. I I should admit that
neither I have archer nor permission to wander.

A Season of Indigence

A SEASON OF INDIGENCE

This drought and curse
Of hand to mouth;
An unrepentant encroachment of pauperism
Impregnating our back country
Discern,
Our bigwigs in back country
Stand aloof
While,
Season after season
Millions of Pickneys
Flourish with kwashiokor
I,
A son of the soil,
A citizen of the world
Peruse no light
At the end of the tunnel 
Jet age swarmed us with gusto,
An age when birds
Learned to flutter incessantly 
Criss crossing the Atlantic and Pacific oceans 
Ushering in a pretence
In social change
Only to abscond
With it's tail between it's legs
Information age,
Just stirred from it's slumber
It's lazy eyes struggling to adjust
To our flickering fluorescent 
Hard drive here....flash drive there.....
Mouse click left....mouse click right....
Still,
I see no light
At the end of the tunnel
Robots are now delegating affairs
Our barns are empty
Our children famished
Poverty is now an opium of humanity
Alas,
Third trimester of harbor, now in labor,
The Surgeon's predigious epidural hype
Adjudged below the belt, still born!

My Kind of Town

My Kind of Town

You said I’d find my freedom
There, where the cliff crags slip
into the dead thud of ocean:
Not yet kindred
Not yet able to place
Or misplace me.

I lost my children to the rain
There,
In that place
In that drowned sorrow.

A leap of faith to fall
Into the arms of the screeching rocks
Your abyss
Your farmland
With only the company of cows and crows,
The greens that hurt the eyes,
And the bellowed creek of the townsfolk
Blank-faced and silent as your northern hemisphered
Grey suits and Sunday-sausaged brunch.

It was not your fault Or theirs.
But the pull of the sun
And the cupped hands of indigence
Called me home:
Swallowed and goosed
To the south.

And here,
The dry-mouthed moon
Looks after my people
Cloaked in poverty, yet singing
Colourful mourning songs
In this,
the callous town 
I call my own.

Black

I’m backed into the deepest darkest black corner of my mind
I see no way out all exits are mined
I feel ashamed to feel as black as I do
So many others suffer life’s terrible stew
To compare my troubles are minor and few
But still the blackness eats at my soul
Wears me down and takes a great toll
Suffering comes in so many colors
Affecting the lives of so many others
Hunger and thirst the color of dust
Illness disease the green of disgust
Indigence poverty other hardships of need
Grey and colorless but does not exceed
The bright blood red of torture and war
That covers our planet and goes on evermore
But still The Blackness blinds me to all
Hiding reality as if a great wall
Stands between me and what I desire
A bit of peace and release from this mire

My Cat

My Cat


Intense elation fills my every fiber
as I sense delight arising from within her
while she gently discerns and replaces my pain
that instantly flees in her ardent embrace.

Who is this that has chosen me to be her
solitary lover?  What demands arise from a dancing
heart that fixes her gaze upon my face
and perceives me as her endless elect?

Perhaps she is but a spirit floating through eternity
or even the whisper of God gently brushing my face. 
She dances ethereally, unencumbered by concern
for life itself.

Even if I should be lost in infinity
she would detect me, and there attend to the
indigence she perceived without her
presence - - - this devotee, this shadowy soul.

Ignis Fatuus

Indigence and torch light might be beguiling to a visitor
When he aches for his anguish to deter
Chase tension and scrutiny avert
Yet enduringly rubbing shoulders with them hurts
Amounts to additional burdens and strains exerts.

Digital Distance

We are caught up in this digital distance
Tangled in strings of binary code
Texting in sequence but in silence
Transmitting thoughts on keystroke roads.

We are caught up in tactile indigence
An impoverished need for human touch
We receive electronic mental perceptions
By fonts implied as such.

We are caught up in digital rambling
Ritualistic taps of thoughts and rhymes
Suffocating until we tap, release and enter
Into the electronically charged sublime.

To the Dogs

…to the dogs

He stared at the damp chilly night 
and marveled in frustration
seeing nothing at all -
except the black night

So many years ruined dancing to the same tune
days and night overlapping into an endless timeless space

Indigence, parched throats, empty ragged pockets…
guns persist as unflawed blood flows into the filthy cesspools
maggie dogs, scavenger, urchins all blend into one
all in a split race for the a place in the bins

At first light 
blurred images flash past his eyes 
cheese and butter, wines, champagne, music and festivals
laughter and smiles
- the taste of a gone era

Flashy cars with tinted windows speed by
on the highway 
towards the glass towers and 
the affluence beyond the mind’s eyes

Numerous gaps along the road 
shattered dreams, tattered bridges
dyed-in -the-wool banal lip services
Shame!

A curse from the bowels of the earth or 
is it a monster 
from our flesh and bones 
or both?

Skint

Feel the indigence approaching 
Think of no-one and of nothing else
Heart-breaking, all consuming
Penniless pauper, from a storybook romance

“No mon, no fun”
I hear that
No nothing, no life
No growing full or fat

Who to turn to, who to run from
Incipient pauperdom permeates every thought
A threadbare mind to match threadbare costume
Unravelled, patchy, overwhelmingly fraught

Never overburdened with wealth 
But enough to cover simple costs like clothes and heat and food
It should never have to come to this but it has
Only I can lay the blame upon myself

Not a lifetime of jeremiads
Some better stories were once told
Those times a yellowed memory now 
Heart and soul, languid, limp and sere

Reduced to meagre, mere being
No possessions means no feeling
We all know that.
Pride as spent as the money itself
How poor, truly sorry
A pauper born, God help me

Indigence

Many
see poverty 
as curse or calamity,
and rather embrace indigence
than change!

• Short Indigence Poems
• Famous Indigence Poems
• Best Indigence Poems
• Read Indigence Poems
• Long Indigence Poems
• Indigence Quotes