Monday, January 15, 2018

Santa Ana River Trail Tent City Hooverville Deja Vu

During the Great Depression and Dust Bowl of the thirties
California was a magnet for the jobless, homeless or living in Hooverville shacks unsturdy
Today along the Santa Ana River trail new tent cities for the homeless
If a home owner a good chance you have wall to wall tents with filth and crime you would like to address
Drugs and alcohol and mental illness may be the leading causes for this growing mess
Along with a complete lack of affordable housing to the growth repress
There is no romantic carefree view of being forced to live under the stars
With growing resentment of the NIMBYs seeking to these tent cities bar
One has to hope that the falling unemployment rates will open up more jobs
That hopefully the thousands of illegals will not from these homeless rob
Being homeless is a sure path to hunger, despair, drugs, crime and alcohol abuse
A sense of quitting, a sense of surrender, a sense of what’s the use
The cities along the tent city Santa Ana River Trail
Are in planning mode to these tents and residents assail
To their access to their tents and sleeping bags block
Sweep them from the trail in the evening after six or seven o’clock
In the hope not realized that these unfortunates will magically disappear
Instead of in greater numbers each day in different places reappear
Great groups like Habitat for Humanity cannot even begin to address the housing need
Second Harvest cannot even begin to find all the food to the hungry feed
If we can provide support to 200,000 Salvadorians for decades after their earthquakes
Cannot we not find communal shelter, a meal, job training as opposed to quickly to forsake
We cannot help each and every human in this county with grave economic, medical and emotional needs
But in the sense that charity begins at home we can for our citizens first plant the hope and recovery seeds.
© January 15, 2018 Michael P. Ridley aka the Alaskanpoet
Alaskanpoet for Hire, Poems to Admire           

Poet Extraordinaire Beyond Compare    
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