by Esther Greenleaf Murer
This is no case of petty right and wrong,
of "I am right and you are sinister."
The issue's deeper, much more frightening.
The rich, the sybarites, the comfortable
triturate the faces of the poor,
equating poverty with unrighteousness:
"The jobless and the homeless aren't contrite,
or else they'd lay themselves right down and die."
We march, we tweet, write letters, sign petitions,
adapt time-hallowed rites to new occasions,
striving to thwart the frightful sly erosion
and outright theft of our entitlements,
our birthright given by the founding fathers—
golden promises now revealed as pyrite.
Esther Greenleaf Murer lives in Philadelphia. Her work has appeared in numerous online zines; links can be found on her blog. She published her first poetry collection, Unglobed Fruit, in 2011.
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