Excerpts from Miriam’s Kitchen’s Thoughts After Breakfast:

THIS IS MIRIAM’S KITCHEN
a group poem

I move through the streets, I get food stamps
I find myself being followed
by people I don’t know
quite often
homeless people
they also follow me
there was a guy last night
sitting at my head
I don’t know his name but
I know his face
I’m leery of the streets
a cop did that –
a cop beat up John
broke his arm
can you imagine
when you walk along the streets?
The first one they prey on –
I don’t want to mess with anyone
read my newspaper
went to buy me a big soda
check out the wallet
how much cash you have
what you’re buying
Silence – they say silence is golden.
Cops. You don’t worry about the cops, the other homeless
guys –
it’s enough to drive you insane –
What beer is that that says
go for the gold?
Some of the guys do act kind of crazy
he wears a red hat
twitching hand
the waitress – she’s cleaning the table while we’re talking,
no words spilling.
I am leery of this guy –
you get bad vibes
“I’m gonna do you some damage”
you can learn a lot in these restaurants
at this table they’re talking about drugs
this is called Miriam’s Kitchen
This guy’s a white guy
I stay away from the crowds
first of the month they’re always high
they always hit you from behind

this is called Miriam’s Kitchen
you can learn a lot from this restaurant

may I have another cookie?

He’s always talkin’ about food!!
Always smilin’

this is Miriam’s Kitchen
this would make a nice restaurant
ever really think about it?
3/17/95

AN EMPTY PITCHER

How can you refill an empty pitcher
that has broken and gone to dust?
Or drive again that showroom car
that was totaled and turned to rust?
And how can you make that empty space
that seems so empty and hollow now
But once was full of a loving face
And built on dreams of a happy place?
Maybe when the earth stops turning
And when the last raindrop falls
Perhaps that’ll ease the yearning
Of the ghost from memory’s halls.
Until then we have to keep living
This life that was entrusted to us
And try somehow to be giving
till the day we, ourselves, we are dust.
Charles E. Syhr

DON’T SCREAM

A mist rose from the earth making fog as thick as steam, car
lights and street lights illuminated through what looked like a
watery cream – it was eery and dreary and walking into
something was almost scary – but it was cold and the fog
hung – it clung to me and chilled my being, for in the park
where I lay without tent or sleeping bag was a drag – it hurt
cause I was no one in the fog, might as well been a tree log
to sit on, not shit on like some two leggers do, you have a voice
said, get out of this park in the dark you must find another
home in the mist like gorillas in the jungle but there’s no
family to be with, so I am with me a lonely situation this is,
displeased and teased by all the wealth around me, I
sneeze, then freeze cause only my clothes can block out this
cold mist oozing like watery cream, don’t scream cause I’m
lonely cause the wrong thing might hear me, don’t beg when
your hungry, the wrong thing might feed you, don’t sit still
cause the wrong thing might sit next to you.
Neal Avery

I SAW YOU

I saw you when you walked by yesterday morning
and I was Truly Touched – my heart actually skipped a
beat – fluttering as you walked by.

I caught your eye through my glimpsing at you in your long
gray coat
and the shining heels and WOW look at those legs – but your
face was what
really caught my eye, the look that existed was of many
things. Being a
man and you a woman does not mean that all I do is lust
for you but I
do desire you in many ways – To capture the look on your
face whenever and
whatever you are doing because your beauty shines from
within and people
can see it on the outside. BEWARE, some of them know
not of
when they see or how they are looking, and some are
looking with evil eye –
to do negative things but you are innocent to a lot of the
ways of this
world and I do not want too possess you but maybe just be

with you for a while,
I think.
Neal Avery

DIRTY LINEN IN PUBLIC

A sheet after a wedding
night told neighbors
what they demanded.
The rule of thumb by
gossip law – unwritten
rule commanded.

But I prefer my open brand
where I select what’s said.
Somethings are of no great care,
and so should lay as dead.

Others on my launching list
doesn’t bother me to state,
for they may hang upon my line
to blow in winds of fate.

And come what may
I hung those things to dry
then blow away –
I’ve hung them up while
what remains are things
I need not say.Kathy G. Reed

THE BEAST OF BEAUTY

Beautiful
Was the beast within.
Some were fearful of it
While some made the beast
Their friend.
There were traces
Of compassion
And kindness
And sight penetrates
Through the blindness
Of our ideas.
About the beast of beauty
There was an ugly side
To this beast
With its anger, hatred
And warring
And now that the beast
Has absorbed some love
The once ugly side
Became very boring.
Now the beast
Will never be the same.
Filled with compassion
This beast is tamed.
Gregory Hill
aka Jahi