Destitution Poem by Richard Weissman

Why can't he write screenplays or marry money
or trade his soul for a three-pieced check stub,
The landlord is calling, calling for the death of plastic.
The destitution of poverty he knows, dreads,
With its feverish, wind-torn hunger and wide-eyed, shelterless eves,
seeking kindling to exorcise cold souled nightmares,
Nightmares of his mom tormenting him with venomed phrases,
phrases infecting wounded insecurities - all for gilded coattails,
Asking, "Why can't you write screenplays or marry money
or trade your soul for a three-pieced check stub? "
But the music of words, like an impatient madman is ranting again,
Again in his head,
Whispering sinisterly, blackly,
"If words birth destitution, then they birth destitution."
And the landlord is calling, calling for the death of plastic.

- From "Voices of the Dark" (1991)