Freedom Served

This is a nation that has lost all sense of priorities. One suite at the Stupor Bowl cost $277,000! We've military bases in over 135 countries the last time I counted. The right side of the Supreme Court has become the living embodiment of the "judicial activism" many conservatives bemoaned for decades. Government/Business is actually one in the same entity. We send kids off to die allegedly to "spread Democracy" while we bankroll any Autocratic/Totalitarian bastard who will do our bidding. We ignore science at ours and our children's peril, claim to be a "Christian nation" and have made Las Vegas (Sin City) one of America's favorite "family" getaways. We export more firearms than any country on Earth and spend more on the military than all other countries combined. Yet many want to gut programs for the poor, sick, old, unemployed, women and anybody else without a big, fat stock portfolio. We bomb around in over-sized gas hogs affixed with American flags and Support the Troops stickers without having the slightest idea what the people of the Middle East are REALLY mad about. We play video games, listen to I-Pods and talk incessantly on cell phones about anything or nothing, often the latter. We're eating ourselves to death and many of us still believe the world owes us something even though they can't tell you why. We're Rome on Steroids, Fast Food and Caffeine. Freedom served.

Thumbs Down

Rome on…
Fast Food, Steroids, Caffeine, Firearms
Fox News, Netflix, Alcohol, Silicon Charms.
Hedge Fund Operators deserving years in jail
Meth Dumb Misfits searching for the Holy Grail.
Caligula would have loved Sin City.
Nero gave poor the same amount of pity.
Perpetual war, Profiteering Politicians, Coliseum, Super Bowl
The U.S.Anachronism…Empire, extracts toll.

Harvest Time

He was the nameless one
He came from beyond the mountains
He drifted from across the sea
He was silver tongued and impeccably attired
He was gregarious and affable
He wrapped warm fingers amicably around others
He placed pursed lips on silken baby’s skin
He smiled in irresistible, beguiling fashion
He shook the world with his “conservative” voice
He watched, disaffected, as millions died
He walked on humanity, feet never touching the ground
He preached the gospel of prosperity
He castigated those unable to climb the mountain
He berated and belittled those drowning in the sea
He was evil incarnate, the spawn of Mankind’s debauchery
He was everything and nothing, the last thought before sleep
He lived at the pinnacle of mans dreams and the depths of their depravity
He fed on suffering and sold it as salvation
He belched malfeasance and re-packaged it as ambition
He claimed a divine guidance and reverence for the Earth
He was the envy of malevolent men and wanton women
He seized the world and squeezed, and when he was satiated
He departed…over the denuded mountains…across the sullied sea
He still had no name…those who knew him…simply called him… “Profit”

Pyramid Scheme

Taxes eliminated…Plutocrats dream
Union busting…Corporatist scheme
Health care for profit…Social Security
Wealth distribution?…Fiscal impurity
Medicare, PBS…In the sights
Gays and Lesbians…Equal rights
Environmental…Degradation
Massive financial…Deregulation
Nutritional subsidies…In home care
No minimum wage…No welfare
War profiteering…Wall Street smiles
Say “Sig Heil”…On the Pennsylvania Mile
Fascism flying in the land of the free
The day D.C. …….Went B.C.

Humanity on a Cactus Cross

Joshua trees stand sentry
Over harsh landscape
Tarantula…Rattlesnake
Vie with scorpion for hinterland supremacy
Navahos watch, “The Price is Right”
In squalid, sun baked trailers
And in gleaming, gloating legislative halls
Pale-Omythic shadows of Der Fuehrer
Wielding hammers of Malignant Iron
Strive to drive the finals nails
Sealing…The coffin of equality

1956er

We fell asleep under summer stars, the sound of cricket violins
Competing with the nocturnal cries of the killdeer
The Milky Way stretched to infinity and the roar of the freeway
Lying years ahead in a future we could not predict nor comprehend
We played baseball upon fields of Bermuda and clover
In the neighborhood school field with bats nailed and taped together
The ball wet from morning dew until becoming a sinking red ball
Dropping down out of sight behind the skyline of Mt. Diablo
We swam and fished in the Calaveras, the murky waters full of perch
And laid upon the warm boards of the dock until our skins were bronzed
Before jumping in to join the fish and once capturing a large turtle
Then painting his shell like an American flag before releasing him
We raced our bicycles and constructed ramps of scrap lumber
Trying to emulate the daredevil exploits of Evil Kneivel
Baseball cards, worth thousands someday, clicking in the spokes
Of Sting Rays with sissy bars purchased by Dad’s hard earned money
We raced popsicle sticks down gutters of August sprinkler water
And hurled water balloons with amazing accuracy
Until stopping for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and kool-aid
Then playing Monopoly or Tripoly until the inescapable call for dinner
We made excuses for undone chores and slipped quietly outdoors
To wrestle in sticky air and tired grass getting itchy all over
Then raced back to the schoolyard to play hide and seek
The shadows creating mysteries, to be deciphered by amateur detectives
We knew nothing then of war, of politics, of avarice, of hatred
And we faced the world with the reckless abandon only youth can provide
Never imagining or even considering the cruel realities of tomorrow
Humanity’s seemingly endless descent into the pit of debauchery
All this…And so much more…Thank God…For That

Made in the Shade

Grass replaced dirt…A new driveway paved
One house long abandoned…Gratefully saved
Men painted…and planted…flowers abound
But the high point for me…was new tree in the ground
As Fall brought chilled nights…the young, sapling tree
Dropped its tiny, cherished leaves…on lawn now dewy
Its slender, barren limbs…so puerile, so exposed
So alone, braved winter…without any clothes
I drive by often…and pay respects to that tree
And envision a day…it will rise beyond me
Children may play…’neath long, spreading forks
Perhaps a picnic one day…complete with wine cork
Of course the tree will grow older…perhaps, so will I
One day “my friend” on the corner…will be unaware that I die
Yet until that day arrives…I shall go on being enchanted
Perchance a “new life” awaits…those who are planted