Change

[just mercedes]

Dirty and disheveled

No shoes (on his feet) where else would he have them?

Tired and famished

No food to eat that's what 'famished' means

His pockets empty

His last penny spent already said in the previous line

All that remains

A hole and some lint so the pockets aren't empty?

All he owns in a basket

A box for a bed except for the box?

A story written in a notebook clunky - try 'a notebook story'

This is what it read: clunky - how did you come to read it? not the sort of thing that happens much, with homeless beggars

"I was sixteen when I left

(Nearly) twenty two when I returned

My left arm completely gone

My right severely burned

I wasn't just a boy

I was so much more

I was a soldier

An asset to (a) war

I gave my all

Barely came out alive[/font]so - not quite all?

I survived the struggle

Now I struggle to survive good inversion there

I was dealt a bad hand cliche

The system had four aces cliche

I went all in

And came out among the faceless faces" clunky

As I finished reading

I thought it (somewhat) strange

For all (that) I owe this man

Why does he only ask for change? do you mean ask only?

Your poem takes a sympathetic look at a homeless man - but it's too abstract for me - where is his bad breath, dirty fingernails? This encounter doesn't feel 'real' to me.

I think a lot has to do with the way you present the idea.

You spend a lot of time in the poem 'telling' the reader rather than 'showing' them. A description of breath, hair, teeth, flapping sleeve smell etc as seen and experienced by the narrator, would show your reader all they need to know about the man. It would also enliven your poem, which otherwise becomes a bit of a list of statements rather than a
poem.

Rhyme or not, strict meter or not - make up your mind and stick to it.