Category: poetry

Treasonous Restoration

The once silenced sentiment

Finding voice in our modern age

Now screams in rage:

BUILD A WALL

WHITE POWER

MY PRESIDENT SAYS WE CAN KILL YOU NOW

GET OUT OF MY COUNTRY

 

And on it goes

Until an absence of color

Signifies ownership

Of Justice whose scales were sold

And tore off her blindfold,

Of Liberty whose anger more than scorched,

That book of law before that torch

She turned and hurled into the Caspian

To douse the betrayed flame.

 

Robes torn, heads covered in ashes

Justice and Liberty now sit on the ground,

Crying out:

 

With headstones overturned

And threats to Abraham’s schools,

How long before another night

Of broken glass?

 

With two now dead in Crescent City,

How long before the crosses burn

As the noose is placed round

The necks of Nubians

How long before the crosses twist,

And on them, shepherds are tied

And left in the cold to die, crucified?

 

When did the colors of our flag turn:

Red, White, and Black?

Trash at the Curb

Trash by the curb
Cardboard boxes nested
One within the other
Standing upright, resting
Against the edge of the smallest,
An old collage Walmart picture frame,
Matting included,
Old photos still within the frame,
A wedding, a first baby then a second,
Graduations and first cars,
Pictures telling a story of a family,
Colors faded by the sun
Having spent years by a window

After Eruption

Rend the earth again
Tear, rip through miles of rock and soil
Till the swollen, rounded,
core lies exposed
Bubbling, glowing,
Sputtering out
Reaching tendrils of itself.
Note the flow,
Time the pulses of heat,
Beating with undulating life seen and unseen.
Then watch the viscous liquid cool,
Solidifying against the pain
Of each cold breath you expel
Stilling the beat of life.

The transformation to cold, hard stone
Within the earth’s crust
As thus,
A mother’s heart,
Torn open once too often,
Stops.

The Saddle and The Bit

Place the saddle,
Force the bit,
Ride us all
As you wish.
For that’s your dream
To feel such power,
As you surely never felt
Surge between your thighs.

But now the blood flow to the brain
Must be your impediment,
For you to blunder and believe
We could be fooled, trained, broken
To your prideful will
By whipping us with hate
And all the while saying
It is for our own good
To know our place
Till we become beaten slaves,
Smiling, nodding, shuffling on,
Muted and grateful you own us
Since we, at least, survive.
While you, smug and smiling,
Play the benevolent, loving master,
As is the lie of your fantasy.

Cloaked in liberty won
In the blood of our history,
We watch
Your strutting, angry buffoonery
As we stand proud,
Refusing the saddle and the bit,
Fighting against the whip,
We will not smile
We will not nod
We stride and march,
Rejecting everything
You would twist us into
As you claim to make
Our nation great once again
We rise to free our nation
From you, the enemy of democracy,
As is the reality.

The Mother’s Hope

What we know of words upon a page
Read, learned over again until sated
In the richness found
Then turn to the electronic blue haze
Where even words resonate, echoing fade
For the sweetest lies hate mongers craved
Swoon over one hundred forty plastic flowers
Like the words of a lover’s refrain
Written once too often in wooing others
As cheap plated jewelry’s shine
Turns black in the bitterness
On the day the Mother of Exiles cried
For the words beneath her feet crumbled
And the book she holds nearly fell,
Upon its cover, the date when something pure,
Something of meaning and hope was born
No longer revered, respected, held dear
By those with a need to instill hate and fear.

The Mother raised her head,
Found her footing once again,
Held close her book of law
When she saw the children of her nation arise,
Stand strong against the peddlers of fear
And by their numbers shout a resounding, “NO!”

observation

petals of an orange lily

wilted, browned by a summer sun

in an airless blue sky

where white clouds

stretch tight, thinning

in naked vulnerability

Words Fail

 

Feast on a meal of bitter herbs
As you sit in the old rocking chair
Witnessing eyes like your own
Staring at you with murderous hate
You cannot sit where once you rocked warm softness

You stand, pace a bit, perch on a stool
And think of all those years ago,
Had you known, had you known–
Smeared the lamb’s blood on the lintel
And waited in prayer
For the cloud of contagion to pass

Faith becomes a sour cup
From which to drink,
And the writer’s ink dries to dust
Upon the page,
Swept away
By the winds of age.

Purged

 

all the words have been emptied out
scrubbed cleaned
some were trash and tossed
into a bin
walked to the curb
to be hauled away

and of those cleaned
no sparkling diamonds
no lustrous pearls
just words
of dulled cut glass
nothing to catch the eye
inspiring a heart or soul
to take flight
nothing to hit the gut
twisting in recognition
of human frailty
nothing to batter against the lid
of a mind or soul locked away
freeing it finally from a prison
so it is best perhaps
to end at the recycle bin
and then to rest after such cleaning

Cleaning

To clean a heart and soul,
the way we clean a house:
scrub away
the grime and grease,
bleach away
the mold and mildew,
polish away
the dusty dullness,
vacuum away
dirt and dust
and leaves and grass
tracked in on muddy
dog paws,
who then shake wet fur
all over the floor,
yes, even vacuum away
all the hair shed upon the floor
by dogs and you,
then mop away
dried dirt,
straightening and organizing
as you go.

Then rest,
enjoying the gleam and shine
before opening the door
to visitors once more.
Yes, if only a soul
Could be cleaned
So very easily.

small

small talents
rejoice, at times,
in flames,
in the whirling noise of shredders,
and deadly quick deletes
to erase
all