Control

I don’t want help because I don’t need help; I don’t want to owe

you. There is nothing wrong with me. the streets are my home,

I don’t want a soft squashy bed—this threadbare blanket is all I need.

My weathered arm is my pillow.

You believe because you are pampered

in a home with a roof, a yard, and a white picket fence

that everybody needs or wants it, haven’t you heard?

We don’t want that. Would you want me as your neighbor—

we want our freedom

of labor.

You don’t want my lifestyle

and I’m not pushing it on you—that’s vile.

I’m not demanding that you sleep in a doorway

across the way from me—okay?

I wouldn’t want you in my ’hood with your bossy self

and lofty temper.

Oh, so you’re helping, I see, but it comes with strings,

and it’s all a tangled mess;

it takes patience to unravel.

Your words as dry on your tongue as month-old moldy bread

lecturing in a language with concepts I disagree

because fancy doesn’t mean free.

Relinquish the dispersal of control

You’re speaking a different language. I can’t quite translate.