The Dump

I work for a dumping ground. Not the kind, where on any given day, you will find people rummaging thru old and unwanted commodity or maybe searching out that forgotten antique, searching for any thing of value. I wish it were.
I work for a human dumping ground. Unwanted humanity, indeed, are these. Homes, they have not, family unwilling and willing forgotten and friends in uncertainty. These, used disabled, mentally ill, lost, war struck (some born this way, some made this way and some chose this way) all of them scattered, stranded and left for not, on a six block island in the middle of our vast sprawling AZ County. People, Organizations, Agencies, Cities, Towns, Counties, AZ State and yes even other States, dump here.
No one comes to find their value. No one comes to seek their lost or their sick. Not one comes seeking their wisdom, hope or resolve.

Some, they chose to stay; they have been here far too long.
Some, they have to stay; for without value, where else do they belong.
Some are so frail and worn; they have no choice but to stay.

All these, I take home to my sleep each night, the dumped, the ill, the broken, the damaged in soul, those who no one wants to claim as their own.

So, I rummage thru unwanted souls each day. Each day looking for the value that I will find as great, such things as wisdom, kindness, joy and faith. Even more hope, peace, love, knowledge, perseverance, honor, loyalty, and grace. Blocks of treasures, as far as the eyes can see, with value beyond my greatest too compare!

So, at night when I lay down with unwanted humanity at my side, I ask, are we born to not value, are we made to not value or have we chosen not too value (THE SOULS OF HUMNAITY)?

This is a poem I wrote while working at the homeless campus in down town Phoenix.