Ragpickers

Staring out.

A hole-ridden dirt road bobs my head.

Tents. Hundreds? Thousands? No.

Millions.  

Black trash bags draped over bamboo poles,

A sea of starless nights.

A stagnant pool of wishes.

Two kids crawl out, boy and a girl.

Siblings?

Torn shorts, no shirts.

Bare and naked, I see

but I don’t. How could I?

Congress says no problem.

“Lower the BPL!”

For if less have less, we have more.

More what? More right to say we fucking took it all?

Might as well just throw them out too,

All 500 million.

The children held hands and

Walked into the dusty dusk,

The weight of the waste of the world slowly filling their burlap sacks.

Andrew Vance