ABANDONED
Trash carelessly thrown from speeding cars
decorates desolate roadsides across America.
Garbage graffiti sends a strong statement
of disregard for order––or our country.
Twisted paper cups with bent straws,
crumbled cans next to smashed bottles,
dirty diapers, empty plastic bags wave
in the wind witnessing abandonment.
Men in orange prison jumpsuits arrive
to gather the remains of our laziness.
Freed for the day from daily confinement
in guarded enclosures, they collect litter.
Convicted felons charged with cleanup,
bring order back to the society that bans
their presence, uses their labors while
imprisoned, separated from loved ones.
Abandoned by society, banished to barren
localities, locked up and judged useless
like our garbage––forgotten––tossed aside,