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Our future for a dollar and our nature for a holler.
Just step in time and fall in line, bow to the tarry hauler.
Steal it from the blue, paint it shiny, red, and new.
Protect the sea, but build line three, and twin the mountain queue.
Jumped on the wave inspired, but that voting plan backfired
Forget the trees, hug pipes now, please, and light your drinks on fire
Banners in the air, orange pom poms shake with flair.
No one’s keen for fallen green, and stand up no one dares.
I watched one day two scenes unfold before my very eyes,
Contrasting views of the same dream—one truth, one soothing lies.
The first saw hordes of people stroll along a narrow path.
Within their cliques, they held the rail, engaged in lovely chat.
They reached the end and ate some fruit, and licked their lips right clean.
Their bottled hair, their plastic lips, all effort left unseen.
The other showed a harsher view that one would never choose,
For it was dark, and tough, and hard, with scar, and sprain, and bruise.
There was no garden stroll this time, replaced by mountain crag.
Each step unsound, each grasp unsure, so many slips and snags.
Each climber clung fast to the rail, afraid of death below,
And pulled with all exhausted might—the journey wrought and slow.
With sweated brow, and knuckles raw, and shoulders drooped in pain,
The climber inches forward more and up each day again.
The burdened sigh, the trickling tear, the hopeful glance above.
The couraged step, the trembled voice, the awkward embraced love.
The desperate heart, the longing soul, the lingering desire.
The tightened chest, the grieving breast, the eager want for higher.
The drooping frown, the trying smile, the piercing hunger pangs.
The drowning self, the tired feet, the mem’ries of hymns sang.
Th’unsteady hand, the unsure stand, the anxious cluttered mind.
The wearied yoke, the wroughted core; a prayer in these I find.
I once looked up from where I sat and saw my shelf seemed odd.
I cocked me head and looked perplexed, quite sure somehow it’s flawed.
I stood, stepped close, inspected it, noticed the smallest crack.
Got my duct tape, tore off a piece, and fixed it like a hack.
I went to sail the ocean blue upon the zion ship.
I packed my bags and bought my pass, excited for the trip.
The gangplank down, about to board, I noticed rust astern.
I got some paint, and patched it up, and settled all concern.
Hiding in plain sunlight while sifting through the sky,
Looking for the rainbows as heaven has a cry.
Snagging them with morals, ignoring all the pain;
Pushing them through prisms to make them white again.
There’s no coloured sunshine; we’re all offspring of God.
Hospital for sinners, but you’re the one who’s flawed.
Wash your clothes of crimson with mission and a ring
Frying eggs while naked and pick a hymn to sing.
Casting out your children and use them as a goat;
It’s because we love them we overlook our mote.
Prayer and scripture study will wash away your sins
Off your flags and banners and shiny rainbow pins.
We crawled out of a golden book and spread across the land
And whispered from the dust, they said, secured by angels’s hand.
Were sent to a choice hemisphere, yet from God’s presence banned.
We prospered, fruitful, multiplied, as if like grains of sand.
And then they came to us in pairs to tell us we were lost.
They took our culture, stripped it bare, and nailed it to a cross.
Straightened our souls, split them in two; the rest they burned as dross.
Clothed us in white, arm to the square, into the water tossed.
But we weren’t fast enough for them to leave our savage ways;
They scooped our children from our homes, so they instead could raise,
To fold their arms, and break their bread, baptize them with a blaze,
And bleach their skin to make them fair—delightsome was the phrase.
Let freedom ring, liberty sing,
Democracy to nations bring.
Your child’s soul and your black gold
From jawbreaker to Aleppo.
We’ll take your coat so you can vote,
Replace your home with rubber boat.
Sending our pawns at crack of dawn
Quarter million forever gone.
When we’re done, well shoot our guns
Buy plastic flow’rs and pin them on.
Ignore the legless and the breathless.
November glorify the deadness.
Where will you go? I do not know.
Where rivers flow or breezes blow
Where flies the crow or sunsets glow
Search high and low, look to and fro
My garden hoe, My front yard mow
Drink cups of joe, and sweet cocoa.
Eat lots of pho, and risotto,
And sweet gateaux, and cookie dough,
Pistachios, and sloppy joes.
Pay debts I owe, crush status quo
A blanket sew, make forts of snow
Go watch a show, a baseball throw
Get painted toes and toss yo-yos
Dive deep below and bang bongos
Wear cheap chapeaux, stay in chateaux
Eat sweet cocoa, invent gizmos
Take up judo or tae kwon do.
Shoot a crossbow, chase tornadoes
Run in meadows or write memos
Ride the Metro, visit Moscow
Buy a Pinto, follow rainbows
Sort my photos, help the rhinos
Embrace shadows, climb up willows
Read some Thoreau, master tiptoe
Replace my “oh…’ with lots of “woah!”
Watch puppet shows from long ago.
Grow potatoes and tomatoes
Just take it slow. That’s where I’ll go.
Extinguished fire, now cold and dark, that blazed once bright and sure,
That warmed my self, my heart, my soul and made my spirit pure,
I watched you die as rain poured down and choked your fighting flames.
I frantically worked day and night to save you; ’twas in vain.
I tried to feed you splintered wood from off my broken shelf,
But you returned just smoke to me—no heat, no light, no health.
I sat there staring at the ash for days and weeks and months,
Waiting, hoping, wishing, too, that flames to me would come.
But nothing came. ’Twas all in vain. My efforts fruitless now.
I needed faith, and courage, too, to stand and leave somehow.
And so I planted feet down firm, clung to the frigid hearth,
Stood up, breathed deep, hung down my head, and stepped with heavy heart.
But then, just then, something had gleamed deep in the snowy ash:
An ember, lone and minuscule, beckoned to me, “Come back”.
A spark exists! A hope of flame, something there inside,
But still no fuel, and rain still falls. All I can do is sigh.
Ruby red, no, scarlet red, the blood stains on their hands.
Innocence delayed ten years, now teach them how to dance
Orange like the glowing coals of fire dying out;
Bellows, worn and tired now, have fin’lly shut their spout.
Yellow sun has dimmed its light, its service drawn to close
Tried so hard to shine so bright, but succumbed to the blows
Trees so green have withered dry, poor shelter from the rain;
Stinging drops come pelting down, unleashing bruise and pain.
Bluest skies are just a trick, a clever sleight of hand.
We think it’s true, but when in space, it’s then we understand.
Purple robes and aprons tell us, “All of it is love.
Come to us from down the street, descended like a dove.”
Rainbows come after the storms, or so I’ve heard them say,
But first, I guess, we have to wait for storms to go away.After the Storm
