I have to break a coin and a tattered bill
to squeeze some cheese from it and some bread
that is my art form now: there’s no fooling it
a twenty dollar bill dropped mysteriously yesterday
and today a ten: I am so distracted
trying to squeeze it out
ground down to the end of accounting
I can’t buy the Street Sheet from
the street artist who says he’s been living outside
for three weeks and it was hard
and he has a place tomorrow
in the Tenderloin: I’ve been going around
the block to avoid him
because I’m so broke
not even a word to spare
I wonder if all his paintings have been lost
I threw all mine away
down the years: they’re
fantasies now: out in the world
with its radiance and space
and he with the least resources
is the one who is still making it
San Francisco poet and organizer Sarah Menefee is a long-time homeless rights activist. She is the Homeless Desk on the People’s Tribune Editorial Board, and a founding member of such organizations as the San Francisco Union of the Homeless, Homes Not Jails and 'First they came for the homeless’. Known for her poetry about the streets, her latest collections are Winter Rose, Sign and Holy Eel.
