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COMRADES by Morgan Stephens

Give me the wide-eyed ones

The ones who have a story to tell

Who have seen who made?

the diamond and tipped it over

To pick it up

Crooked eye magnified

And had the strength

to shatter it

Pieces strewn and scattered

a ruined holiday

 

Give me the downtrodden ones

The ones who have been told

They did not see what they saw

Didn’t hear what they heard

Didn’t feel what they felt

That their existence is

Propaganda for the state

And slips a few slices In

Before he slips

Through the back door

 

Give me the ones who do not sleep

With thoughts inside thoughts

The ones with nothing to wake up to

Except the birds and the branches

And a park bench,

Chains clinking

An donut shop opening

96 cents for coffee

These are the ones for me

Where the only things that kept them

From crawling in their skin

Who’ve walked through fire

And felt the bumbling of the

Hive mind

 

Give me the ones who do not

Know moderation

Or paths to follow

Except their own

And walk down the line of the sun

Excessive, extravagant,

Unnamed.

The first and the lonely

A good fight, a drum

 

Give me the ones with addictions

To battery acid and filth

Whose sensual legs gleam sweat

In their midsummer sighs

Give me the soft ones

And the calloused ones too

Whose softness was carved out of them

Sliced open their wholeness

Chip by chip,

Whittled away at the bone

until it cracked at the center

And fell

forward backward down

I will meet them there

 

Give me the ones who suffer

A hand clasped into mine

We will take our heaviness

And jump off the dock

Into our down comforters

Of words and nature

And the softness

Of grieving eyes

Of the single love

That binds us

The love, all there is

Give me those

In their circle tribe

Howling at smoke