Day 8: The Bread of Poverty

The bread of poverty greets me outside of
Whole Foods on my way home
Tries to sell me Street Sense and
I never see anyone take out a dollar
Not even me
Unless I promise my friends I will
And even then
It sits in the corner of my room collecting dust
Like my tax returns.

The bread of poverty is hiding under freeways
Pulsing through this city like it’s part
of the blueprint
We’ve gotten so good at tucking it away
Inside alleys of new condo buildings
In particular parks where the Central Kitchen van stops
To hand out breakfast
Where no one passes walking to work

It creeps from the park to our front stoop
On nights I pull the door to our complex shut behind me
The bread of poverty has a prosthetic hand that holds a
Starbucks cup outside of Starbucks
and doesn’t say a word
It is in the mushed porridge brain of the women
with bullet hole hair in Dupont
And the still-cold DC nights that
shiver me to sleep.