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It started in 1986
Four years before the birth of a lightening storm
When a man who served his country
With two decades of honor
Discharged from his contract of service
It started in 2012
Twenty-six years after the release of a hurricane
When a young man joined a student coalition
And volunteered to an afternoon at a mens homeless shelter
He himself now doing the service
What was I thinking?
This started with a game of Uno
When a lightening storm met a hurricane
Their destructive product, a light grenade
An explosion of knowledge and experience
They took turns throwing down cards of disappointment
Each card was a new wave in waters of high tide
Each turn he placed a card that told a story
Red
The color of rage
From a man who was promised security,
And abandoned after his contract was up.
Blue
The color of his depression
Suffered from a systematic beat down
3 war tours and watching his brothers with the same blue veins
Blow up in a misunderstanding,
Fighting battles that were not theirs.
Green
The color of money he never received
2 decades past a broken promise
He never received one check of retirement or disability
A government that molded an organized killer
Then discarded him as crippled goods when his time was up
Yellow
The color of a brick road he followed
Leading to what he told was an American dream
“Do your part and work hard and you will be taken care ofâ€
He digressed
Sliding me a paper written to him by his former contractor
With a promise to a brand new home in a few short months
Almost as if back payment for two decades of wrongful exile.
Over 90% of the people staying in this men’s homeless shelter
Were foreign to the city of Charlotte
A queen’s city
Attenuated kings crushed under a broken empire
I could hear the weight of statues
Smashing the grounds of Troy
What could Achilles have done wrong to be caste aside by Menelaus?
“Thank youâ€
Before the eye of this hurricane rested over its temporary home
“I’ve never met a lightening storm before you that could listen
Never seen a bolt walk on the ground without destroying it!â€
©Paris “Chi†Butler, “Homeless Shelter Memoriesâ€. All Rights Reserved. 7/9/2013.
