The Thoroughfares

The spurious hand
Of the curious girl
Explores odd intersections
Of the furious world

With the scenes always shifting
Because shadows exchange
The pretty puffs of prize poodles
For perverse pedigreed mange

Where the streets are all thoroughfares
Upon which motor cars drive
Where people always are going
And yet never they arrive

Bold, bizarre backwards bankers
Turn bonds into stocks
Leaving townspeople beholden
To fortunes predicted in probable rocks

Quiet houses sit empty
While paid closets of extra sit full
Where the rebellious and sickly
Are silently culled

From the counts in a census
And their beds on the street
Because where public meets private
The trading hands are discreet

Poor men of all colors
Are earmarked for jails
And the darker the hue is
The more hefty the bail

And dropping babies at sisters
Their fed up wives clean hotels
Raising cash to fight pipelines
Dragging children to hell

The cities lie divided
By ancient red lines
That faded to eyesight
But grew darker to time

But the people are singing
For freedom from chains
Their voices now rising
From the seas to the plains

No more shifting shadows
No more lies in closed rooms
No more wars to steal oil
No more soldiers in tombs

No more pardons for rich men
But hard labor for the poor
No more Madonnas kept sacred
At the expense of the whores

No, the people now clamor
For a change that will sweep
From the seas to the plains
Over thoroughfare streets

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