I DO NOT SURRENDER

I am beginning to think that what I thought was ’strength’ may be only the numbness of ‘jaded’. Everyday I watch out my back window as the cops at the 5th district gather around the cruisers in the parking lot; standing, talking, sometimes laughing…and I walk out my front door to see the doorway where Helen Hill, my neighbor, was shot to death in a horrible meaningless killing, as yet unsolved. I listen as politicians squander our livelyhood and our city, avoiding responsibility and duty, squirming for higher ground, using our battered city as a fulcrum to power and position. And so many lives are destroyed in the waiting…. Waiting for what? Until another local kid is shot in retaliation for some crazy feud that has its cause too far back to remember? Over a turf war on broken streets & sidewalks? Until another bright light, come here to ‘help rebuild the City’ is gunned down for a a handfull of crumpled bills, barely worth leaving on the bar? It’s a grudge match now. I’ll stay to see the Mayor, the Police Superintendent, the crooked Trash Bosses and Home Destroyers brought down. All the way down, to where we live everyday, fighting for our lives. Or until this city takes my life as well. They are the ones who have allowed this to be; through apathy, greed and self congratulation: A City at War with itself, a frightening body count to their corruption, from the drug dealing cops and copper thieves, to the Mayor of False Awards and the Police Superintendent of No Filed Reports. I DO NOT SURRENDER. Lord David Pirate & Artist Skull Club New Orleans