Where Are We? Why Don't We Seem to Care?

I walk these ghetto streets and am
Troubled by what I see
Needles decorate the pavement
While gun shells adorn the street
God’s helpless children all around
And as I tread these grounds
I wonder to myself
Where are we?
Why don’t we seem to care?

I see young girls of that tender age
Growing up fast in skin tight, too short clothes,
And high heeled shoes
Cigarettes nestled between the painted lips
Disowned, ignored, neglected, needing
So they sell their priceless innocence
To grown men on these streets
Some supporting acquired habits
Some just trying to eat
And I wonder to myself
Where are we?
Why don’t we seem to care?

I can’t fathom how we got this way
We are killing our brothers and sisters
Over such elementary things
The young men we are rearing up
To be so much less than
We open their hand and put a gun in it
Before we will the books that
Our fathers fought and died to acquire glimpses of
We are tearing each other down with
Secrets, manipulations, and lies
We spew out accusations at “the man”
Without understanding the ways by which
We are causing our own demise
So I wonder to myself
Where are we?
Why don’t we seem to care?

Our babies are raising babies
Changing soiled diapers when it seems that
Only a moment ago someone was changing theirs
And they walk with an absent father’s seed
On their hip and smile playfully when men
Are surveying their bigness
Pumped with this new readiness that substitutes
The days when young girls waited to unveil their precious gifts
Now their appearances are sensuous and
Their insides titillated at the sound of men
Calling “Hey Shorty!”
And it pains my heart
Their lack of knowledge in true womanhood
And I cry
Where are we?
Why don’t we seem to care?

Long life has been exchanged for
One night stands making a segway for STD’s
Thinking “not me” before walking into the free clinic
To hear the most dreaded letters in our alphabet
A.I.D.S.
Millions of people diagnosed every time
A report is printed and most being blacks
Lives cut short chasing 45 seconds
And I ask myself
Where are we?
Why don’t we seem to care?

Bring back the days of
Honor and virtue
The days of hardworking men and TCB fathers
The days when grandma wasn’t 35
The days of great leaders like the Malcolm’s and the Martin’s
And cry out with loud voices

I’M HERE!!!!! I CARE!!!!!!