Coins

We throw pennies in a well,
watch them sink without a second thought.
As if our thoughts and dreams
mean a damned enough price
to be thrown into society's glistening pool.

"How much does a coin mean to you?"

That girl who dreamed each night
of a plate full of food just because
her mother was a druggie and her father was gone.
She searched the filthy grounds that humanity's
feet have kicked and abused,
hoping for another cent or dime.

The elder who gave away his life savings
to buy his grandson a shiny new car.
The grandson who crashed a brand new car,
and took his final breath.
Each breath he made,
each shaky step his feet took,
the elder searched the world for a few more cents.

A man who couldn't care less for the shriveled and weak,
gave away a dollar each night.
Wishing that each pretty lady who danced upon a silver pole
could live a little better, could get what they needed each night.
Months upon months of tossing away singles,
he lost his home, his family, his job.
He became the shriveled, the weak, the poor.
And so this man set his mind upon gathering and saving
dimes and nickels and quarters, hoping the coins
wouldn't reject him as his life once did.

Crying out of fear and fright,
a baby left in a filthy jacket lays inside
a bathroom stall, not deserving such injustice.
Would it be hours, minutes, seconds before
this baby accepted death?
Years later this former child clutches upon a coin,
the only thing found in a jacket pocket
that connects her to a lost childhood, a lost life.

Lashes and scars litter the skin of a victim
who never deserved such an abusive fate of rape.
Each night a nightmare of injustice plays
inside the teen who never wanted this life.
Even now, a bulging stomach and eyes full of tears
can't bring her into a life of tranquility.
With parents who rejected her,
and a court who denied such crimes,
all hope seemed to be lost.
Yet she clings upon a penny each day,
trying to save a child, to save a life.

We are rejects and fools,
a box full of society's tools.
Born with a mindset on dollars
instead of coins and cents,
leaving coins to sink down to
what we call a wishing well.
But all is not well, and life is not right.

Dollars can't collect our wishes and dreams,
but yet they can be spent on making life better.
Until we take our minds off of currency and riches,
and more onto life and what it means,
we're all just coins sitting in murky water,
or dollars sitting in purses and wallets and banks.

Was it money that started wars full of tanks
and violence set as an answer to peace?
Was it money that left a world to sit
and wish for bigger, for better?
If only humanity could admire how much
the value of a coin could be.

We throw pennies in a well,
watch them sink without a second thought.
As if our thoughts and dreams
mean a dammed enough price
to be thrown into society's glistening pool.

Never to become more than a symbolic item
of wishes set on a better life, lays a coin
at the bottom of a public fountain.