Growing up Poor

is like Herpes simplex —
never cured, won’t leave,
always texting “let’s hang.”
It just lays there silently,
until life chews me up
and spits me out, like my
first bite of cheap steak — then,
and only then, it slaloms
down a nerve to bloom —
a red peony on
my upper lip.

Years later, mortgage mostly
paid off, bank account flush as
a king tide, the gaunt fingers
of poverty still crawl the
canyon walls of my brain,
whispering “Don’t. Too risky.
You won’t succeed.”

Reaching up, yet again,
I fling away those bony
articulations of the past.

Gary D. Grossman
Poetry Breakfast, 10–18–23