Trying to Get the Kids Back

John Carlos Morrison is a homeless poet who wanders the streets of Beverly Hills in a purple suit, pushing a shopping cart loaded with his life.

Everything he owns is in that cart, including a lot of his poetry, much of which hangs over the side in letters large enough for everyone to read.

Beverly Drive is his beat. Morrison sleeps in the basement of a building not far from Larry Parker’s 24 Hour Diner and the Mocha Cave coffeehouse, where he receives telephone calls.

He knows most of the merchants on the street by their first names and spends time talking to them about things in general, like God and nature.

In fact, that purple outfit he wears with such flair, complete with a purple Zoro hat, was sold to him by a clothing store called the Underground that let him pay it off a little at a time. That’s how much they trust him.

But most of the time Morrison is out on the street in front of these places reciting bits of his poetry.

One of my favorites is, “I’m living in the street/Trying to be very discreet/Trying to be clean and neat/Trying to smell exceedingly sweet/Trying to get ice cream to eat.”

Not exactly “Sonnets from the Portuguese,” but . . . well . . . honest. And short.

About $40 a day is dropped into the plastic cup attached to his cart, which he uses to live on. Another $600 a month that he gets from the state goes to helping out his five kids in foster homes. That’s what I want to talk about today.

*

Morrison has two passions: writing poetry and trying to get his kids back. They’ve been in foster homes for about six years now, ever since their mother abandoned them and he hit the streets. They range in ages from 7 to 15.

He’s been trying almost ever since to convince the courts that he’s decent and reliable enough to raise his own children. They’ve told him over and over again, get a place to live and you’ll get them back.

The problem is, Morrison can’t rent a place on what he makes reciting poetry, and he’s loathe to abandon the muse. Even if he managed to sell some poems, he still probably couldn’t afford to raise five children.

I know published poets who’ve lived on gruel most of their careers because they can’t afford pork chops. You almost never see fat poets.

Morrison’s lawyer, an understanding guy named Benjamin Campos, has leveled with his client by telling him he’s got to give up the street before any court in the land is going to award him custody of the kids.

“He’s a bright man you can talk to,” Campos said the other day. “He sure impressed the judge he was dealing with for two or three years. When she retired, he went to her retirement party and brought her a dozen roses.”

The court has waived parenting classes and other requirements for Morrison, Campos says. It all boils down to that one issue: give up the street life, get a job and get a home.

“I had a place once,” Morrison said the other day at the Mocha Cave, “but they still wouldn’t give me the kids. They said it didn’t have a heater.”

*

Morrison is an ex-fighter and ex-steelworker. I wrote about him two years ago when he hung out in front of Nat ‘n Al’s Deli. He moved when other homeless people began crowding in. Poets like to work alone. They’re funny that way.

I figured he was just jiving me about wanting his kids, but then he’d call from time to time and his message was always the same: Help me get my children.

Morrison sees them often and loves to buy them things. When I was with him the other day he was wearing four watches he’s going to give them next time they’re together.

He had them for a long weekend once and spent half his monthly state income feeding and housing them and taking them to Universal Studios. “It was a swell time,” he says, standing on a corner near Charleville and South Beverly, watching the Lincolns roll by.

The guy isn’t perfect. He’s done County Jail time for battery against a woman, but claims she hit him first. He wouldn’t’ve touched her otherwise. On the plus side, he doesn’t drink, smoke or use drugs . . . and he loves those kids of his with a passion.

I don’t know that he’ll ever get them back, but at least it’s good to see someone who finally wants to accept responsibility for his children, even though his own life has gone halfway to hell.

There are about 100,000 homeless in L.A. County and most of them will die on the streets. I like to think the Poet of the Pavement won’t be one of them. Another bard once said hope waits just around the corner. It’s up to Morrison to turn that corner. He’s got his kids to think about.