MISERY

I knew poverty.
It puts its brand on you...
like a scarlet letter on a whore.
When I was poor, I thought everyone was looking at me.
They saw my torn jeans, my shredded jacket, my worn-out shoes.
But in reality, no-one really looks.
They don't want to see you.
I never realized this, until I made a few bucks.
I spent my whole life breaking my back for money.
I still drive myself relentlessly to make and save it.
I can afford to hire out, but I am fixed in my ways.
Poverty left its mark on me, I guess.
I look at the poor and realize how lucky I am.
I never want that life again.
It's a life of shit rooms, cold baths, cheap booze and lousy women.
I came to a place in my life when I realized that misery isn't specific to the poor.
Everyone has misery.
People who don't have "shit" are too damned busy trying to get "shit", to be truely miserable.
I kind of liked those days working twelve-hour shifts for "the man".
When I got home, I could clean up, and drink a pint of cheap stuff, to ease my pain.
I smiled in my drunken happiness.
I could pass out and drool on my stained pillow.
Misery hit me again with the blaring alarm clock the next morning.
Then, I joined the ranks of working humanity for another day of strife.
'Dem were the days...Bottoms up!