American Caste System

Enslave the different covertly
Build new prisons prolifically

Slavery is big industry
Enforced servitude revisited
Profiting off human suffering done easily

The second class relish in poverty
They are devoid of proper propriety
The have-nots don’t deserve life's delicacies

Can’t you see?

There is no moral penalty
Only pockets brimming with monies

Don’t scoff and sneer in disdain!
Status quo unchanged

The haves are providing a charity
Shelter and food are a gift
Not a callous penalty

Preserve the elite’s plight
The homogenized reek of conventional strife

throw away the jailer’s key
Imprison the different
People who resemble me

Free thinking begets debased penalties
Unforgetable barbaric whippings

Drop to your knees
Take your lashings
Or be lynched
Left dangling from a red oak tree

Naked back expose past revolts
Wounds scarred over bespeak tales of repulse

Cat-o-nine tips tear through hardened skin
Blood pools beneath tortured feet akin

Deceptive I am not
Authentic I am
Put my beliefs through a noose
Choke out my values with society’s self-righteous knot

I remain silent, as the whip screams
Body destroyed, but mind remains keen

Conscience rendered undisturbed
Die on the feet and not on the knees--perturbed

I am string-less
Quasi-conformist out of social convenience
Beat into indifference, yet remain maskless
There is no common thread between us

A societal clone I will never be
warehoused, caged, beaten while incarcerated
I will remain comfortably enveloped in transparency
Unadulterated, pure, and spiritually free