Long Skid row Poems
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Our mayor and city council know what to do
The county supervisors and talk show hosts too
Budget measure HHH we Angelinos passed
Costing billions, homelessness would end at last
There were 57,000 unhoused in L.A. last year
Now it’s 68,000, growing with elections near
The garment district downtown and all of skid row
Are squalid tent camps where filth and despair flow
From the Valley, to Hollywood, out to the beach
Huddled in parks, under bridges, hills out of reach
Some scream and curse, drugged or drunken
Others silent and still, bodies broken, spirits sunken
They’re bad for business, they spread disease!
Will our elected officials do something? Please!
Neglected, abused, mentally ill
There’s really no urgent civic will
Some may receive disability pay
Enough for liquid comfort, but a room? No way
A lifelong Angelino, I feel enraged and defeated
For I see my town by how our worst off are treated
5/31/22
An occasional chance encounter
With a stranger on the street
Can change life like a tidal wave
And lift us off our feet.
The mystery of wakefulness
Like the dance of rolling dice,
Is filled with rhythm, love and hate
Virtue, darkness, light.
Bending ‘round from sky to ground,
Heaven, hell and in between;
An occasional chance encounter
Can turn a whore into a queen.
Who may have been lost in paradise,
Trampled, beaten, bruised;
The **** you spit on yesterday
Might well have been just you.
Or the skid-row drunk whose soul has sunk
So low you can’t relate,
To the pain he knows each time it snows
And the cold winds won’t abate.
Unless, until somebody fills
His heart with dreams again;
An occasional chance encounter
Might mean the world to him.
A word or two of hopefulness,
From nightmares all day long;
A helping hand, one measured stand
Turns sorrow into song.
And now and then when nothing’s wrong
And everything feels fine;
No dark cloud storms or feeling worn
Cast clouds upon the mind.
When all feels well and quite routine
And there’s nothing much to say,
An occasional chance encounter
Can change us all in many ways.
A look in the eye and words that fly
Out of one’s tongue and mouth;
Before we know it love starts to show it
And the heart starts heading down south.
Running away like a child at play
As if never before set free;
Wild in the wind as one begins
To open up eyes and see.
That blindness isn’t limited
To those that have no sight
But affects us all the weak and small
Every day and every night.
As now and then like a Zephyr wind
A stranger comes a’ calling;
Before we know we’re all a glow
In love and freely falling.
Like a coin toss out of nowhere,
Probabilities, unimaginable;
An occasional chance encounter
May render life numinous, unfathomable.
Trust me when I tell you that
There are riches deep inside;
Every soul that ever lived,
Struggled, loved and died.
As it is written in the book of life
And inscribed inside our heads;
An occasional chance encounter
Can find beauty in the beast within
And love where hatred led.
Facebook?
~ Fake book
Tik-Tok?
~ Shock Jock
What’s App?
~ Jockstrap*
Meta?
~ Greta!
I-Pad?
~ Comrade
Flash Drive
~ Bee Hive
A.I?
~ Pig Sty
IT?
~ Dead Sea
TV?
~ Crappy!
Smartphone?
~ Hand bone
Laptop?
~ Sweatshop
~ For Low-Tech Lovers ~
Slinky?
~ Dinky
Play-dough?
~ Skid row
Juke box?
~ Plaid socks ~ Thanks, Buddy Holly... lol -- Crickets
___________________________
*Are you kidding me, gw?
Died to mainstream, let it fall,
Left our writings on this wall,
Turn on, tune in, but don't drop out, hear the silence scream an the darkness shout,
Concrete dwelling for spirits lost, who found out deaths not the only cost,
Pay with sight, pay with mind, Cuz the devil ain't too far behind,
This lonely tunnel that we called home, long deserted, still skid row,
Now long gone, we found our groove, we've only just begun to move,
Shanties crumbled, rats roam free, names not forgotten, Tommy, Tito, Ralph, Dee,
Many others, still they stand, spread far across the promised land,
Prayers were answered, dark days past, the lost ones found their homes at last.
(This is a tribute to the men and women depicted in the documentary "Dark Days" directed by Mark Singer, and to the thousands of homeless strewn across the country and the world. Let their stories not be forgotten.)
©R.Chirino III
Form:
I used to fantasise about gangsters,
A bad guy who would change for me.
The movie industry told me, the music videos and news stories.
Men acting like children or women dancing like trash, those were my options.
A young Dancer, trying to experience culture that was growing and never stopping.
A young girl from a comfortable culture, new and made of many.
Running from her own but false ideals of authenticity and creativity, constantly played to me.
Processed my grief as a young one, listening to music that was meant to keep me poor.
Promised the artists abundance and left them soulless and sore.
I was in IIn LA in 2015, on skid row, overwhelmed with what to feel.
Standing with William, 17, an ex singer in the church I was giving with... Who had just finished a drug deal.
He told me he could sing, I dared him in my naivity.
He belted Amazing Grace at the top of his lungs, his sound vibrated through the city.
Walked along Hollywood boulevard the next week, stayed in Beverley Hills.
Did no one ing see this from my tour group?
No dots connecting? How are you sleeping still?
Clung onto appropriation as a way to honour what I always knew,
Though grew to disown and rebuke the influences that stuck with me while I grew.
False masculinity, femininity, the furthest from the healthy woman I wanted to be.
Expected to speak on and shake my appendages,
Overload my expenses and for fun, poison my mind.
Young white girls throwing gun hands and popping for thousands, creeps watching, satisfied.
Not advocating for anything, just other appropriators at the desk.
Ticking boxes, discussing talent, deciding who's less.
Sequins and pigtails, thigh slapping and Tik Toks...
I can no longer identify with mainstream competition dance tetris, which is facaded as Hip Hop.
i wonder if there'll come a time
when i forget how to rhyme
when the pen in my hand
no longer writes
when the ideas that i have
are no longer fresh
when the thoughts that are tossed
i no longer catch
when all that remains
is the blank of the page
and the drive i once had
is long in the grave
with the flow running low
as far as poetry goes
leaving the rhymes behind
like a bum on skid row
when all that is left
is the hunger once had
replaced by a hole
that no longer beats in the chest
what would i do
if all this comes true
and have you also thought
that it could happen to you...
"I wandered lonely as a cloud"
William Wordsworth.
I wandered lonely as a puppet thru Reno
Like a weathered kite without it's tail
My feet take in a casino
As I followed that beaten trail
O'er the sea of green I splash
With a wrinkled dollar in cash
I find a table and take in a chair
With my three back packs at my side
Happy I am amongst the stare
Eventhough my lot in life's a low tide
Three patrons pinched their noses
If only they knew how it goes
The dark side of living on the street
A constant bobbing thru skid row
Where every pocket filled with defeat
Twenty four seven, I have nowhere to go
Save for a treasure in the thrash
I find a half eaten burrito to add to my stash
To the other street rats I fear
They'll steal my sandal
Take my cardboard box and gear
And part with my coins from a panhandle
I'm used to being knocked to the ground
But I can only whimper and not make a sound
As I snap out of my nightmare
The dealer ask if my money play
I look down at my bet and say a prayer
Lord, I urge, let this be the day
Let the daffodils spread and spread
The ball lands on black and I'm seeing red
9/20/2022
I Wandered Lonely As --- Challenge Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Natasha L Scragg
7th place
Well over a hundred years ago
The illustrious Vincent Willem Van Gogh
A genius somewhat like Michelangelo
With thousands of artworks in his cluttered studio
From the sublime to the grotesque for show
Might have been better off working as a gigolo
Because he died a pauper on skid row
In those days artists had no impresario
To make sure they lived high in a chateau
Dining on champagne and escargot
So it was quite a different scenario
That brilliant artists lived totally incognito
Often exchanging a painting for a meal on a patio
Or selling their wares door to door on tiptoe
Carrying under their arm their impressive portfolio
So it was for Vincent Willem Van Gogh
Misunderstood and suffering from vertigo
Mentally unstable and drinking heavily in Bordeaux
Depressed, impulsive and insane – a tragic combo
Cut off a piece of his ear, his sanity was touch and go
A troubled soul, life for him was a wild rodeo
Obsessive passion, far from living the status quo
His life and work intertwined shimmying like a yo-yo
Feeling the stranger, he shot himself overcome with sorrow
Post mortem everyone wanted to hear the myth of Van Gogh
With his vivid colors of burgundy, ochre and indigo
In his honor every year the orchestra features the oboe
And while the Italians chant magnifico
Everyone else cheers Bravo! Bravo!
How times have changed for poor Van Gogh
From a mere hundred years ago ~
Read on air by invitation ~ March 21, 2020 'LATE NIGHT POETS'
AP: 1st place 2026, 2nd place 2021, 3rd place 2025, 3rd place 2022, 3rd place 2021, Honorable Mention 2026, Honorable Mention 2026, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2020
Submitted on August 15, 2021 for YOUR BEST MONORHYME contest sponsored by WILLIAM KEKAULA - RANKED 1ST
FRED THE PERV.
Kinky Fred stole knickers off the line
One summer night his haul totalled nine
His spree ended in tears
Got an extra ten years
When Judge Sue said that red pair were mine.
LARS.
A young astronaut from NASA called Lars
Blasted off from Cape Kennedy to Mars
But then there was a glitch
When he pressed the wrong switch
Last seen heading at warp speed to the stars.
PETE.
A young pianist from New York called Pete
Could play William Tell using his feet
But he fell of his chair
And he started to swear
Was booed off and thrown into the street.
JOHNNY GABLE.
A mean old waiter called Johnny Gable
Saw a man choke to death on a bagel
He then shifted his body
To the side of the lobby
Said forgive me but we need the table .
O'TOOLE.
A forgetful pilot Johnny O'Toole
Was over the north sea flying to Bule
Then both engines spluttered
Under his breath muttered
Looked at his gauge and screamed no ruddy fuel.
OLD GANGSTER.
An old gangster rose from rags to riches
Got rid of all his traitors and snitches
They'd find in their bed
A racehorses head
Or find themselves sleeping with the fishes.
THE BAKER.
An unwashed old baker from Idaho
Had filthy fingers when kneeding the dough
Folk choked on his paella
Some died from salmonella
Got closed down and ended up on skid row.
O'KEEFE.
A fella by the name of O'Keefe
Was the long serving town's police chief
Someone stole the mess cookies
Everyone blamed the rookies
But it turned out O'Keefe was the thief.
AMOUROUS MICHAEL.
Amourous young Michael from Mayo
At a girls house he tried to stayo
She started to shouto
And then kicked him outo
Said she" you're not staying no wayo."
NIGERIAN POEM THIEF.
A sly poem thief from Nigeria
On the soup caused a mass hysteria
He stole soupers work
Soupers went beserk
On the run now cos he's in fear of ya.
Written 18th august 2019.
Tom Thumb got caught peeping
Now his life is on the run
Little Bo Peep lost her sheep
On a gambling junket she was on
Little Miss Muffet is having to tuff it
Out these days in jail
Selling ecstasy to undercover police
And now can't pay her bail
Little Jack Horner took him a corner
Of the Mafia drug trade
Once you are hooked on the Meth that he cooks
There's no way of escape
You think that's bad you ain't seen nothing yet
That even comes this close
Since Mother Goose started hitting the juice
And ended up down on skid row
Humpty Dumpty's more than broke
But not from any fall
He couldn't pay his bookie
And his legs were first to go
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Where forced to sell their wool
To pay for all the damages
While they were in school
Jack pushed Jill down the hill
When he caught her cheating with Little Boy Blue
Now he's paying her doctor bills
Which has left Jack blue too
You think that's bad you ain't seen nothing yet
That even comes this close
Since Mother Goose started hitting the juice
And ended up down on skid row