Broke

(Inspired by a National Poetry Writing Month prompt for April on the topic of "broke". See http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/2013-april-pad-challenge-day-12)

Paycheck came Wednesday
Mortgage, taxes due.
Surgery today.
Work trip in a week.
Cash advance needed
before the trip,
or I'll have to call in sick.

Society is broke,
and so am I,
yet in the broken world
of not enough,
abounds plenty.

Scarcity, abundance
Two sides of one coin?

Growing food,
cutting wood,
writing poems,
finding happiness
in borrowed books,
free web sites,
knitting needles
is abundance.

Eating out,
buying clothes,
traveling on debt,
marketing,
corporate climbing
dooms us all
to scarcity.

Broken bodies,
broken towns,
a broken world.
From the ruins
rise
new hope,
as the mortgage
and the bills get
paid (or delayed)
for one more month.