Tenderloin

They say-

Do not
walk in
the fillet
of this city,

atrocity,

possibly.

I say-

Do not
cut the
cow if you
can’t stomach blood

in floods.

Your luck has kept your teeth white,
you could’ve been born
another;
no mother.

Gentrified
worn hyde
hope dried.

He lets out a string of

                jumbled words
and sounds and
coughs and
hums,

silence never comes

to the Tenderloin.