Friday, July 31, 2020

Declarations

Imagine if we acted our ideals:
If what we said we thought were followed through.
Now, when we speak, we say what most appeals
Without consideration of what's true
Within our hearts. We do not have to do
The hard but worthy deeds we wish to claim;
And so we say whatever we want to
Taking advantage of the good we name
Trusting that others, too, will do the same
Thus understanding that we all are playing
A hypocritical but common game
Where no one stands behind what they are saying.
But if the words we spoke remade the facts
Perhaps we'd value words as much as acts.

Thursday, July 30, 2020

Eulogy

Barack Obama is an angry man
Fina-fucking-lly. I cannot wait
To see what he becomes now he's irate.
A calm Obama always had a plan
And I'll admit I always was a fan
But now that he's unleashed his anger: great!
His righteous anger now should not abate
Until he's resurrected Yes We Can
And made us recognize it does not mean
That what we want will magically appear
Or that he will take charge and make it so
But that when, like John Lewis as a teen,
We make good trouble and refuse to fear
We overcome even the fascists' No.

Q2

The economy has suffered a contraction
Which, though announced, was hardly a surprise.
It's rooted in our government's inaction
Also expected, but not nearly wise. 
The graphs of it look forged, or like an error,
A misbegotten failure of our state
I look at them with existential terror
And wonder when we're going to be made great.
I know that blaming the administration
Is oversimplifying at its best
But since it is unique to our poor nation
Some blame at least is theirs. They failed the test.
And worst of all, we cannot help but notice
We have no hope until the change of POTUS.

Tweetstorm

The Constitution gives us a solution
For Presidents who violate their oaths;
It's sitting right there in the Constitution
Within a clause our current leader loathes.
He swore before us to preserve, protect,
And to defend the Constitution--then.
But now he's worried that we won't elect
Him and his false administrative team again.
So he proposes (as we knew he would)
That our elections should now be delayed;
Of course, he didn't think delay was good
A month ago, before support decayed.
This is the final straw. This overreach
Is but another reason to impeach.

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Iowa Summer

The sunlight dapples through my windowpane
To where the dog, anticipating, lies
Sprawled out upon a cushion twice her size
Tongue lolling. I hear a distant train
And, closer, neighbor children, whose campaign
To lure my dog outside meets its demise
With sunny weather, but who advertise
Their presence anyway. I can't complain.
The summer is an idyll in the year
When everyone is happy to be out
And laziness is just normality.
So, like my dog, I'm happy to be here
Listening to children play and shout
While lounging in my immobility.

Monday, July 27, 2020

Rot

I cannot feel the whole of my left leg
And I may never feel it all again.
It didn't crack at once--not like an egg--
But slowly slipped away. The time was when
I had two working legs, and then it wasn't.
I cannot draw the line between them cleanly.
Sometimes the body works; sometimes it doesn't
And though I feel the latter all too keenly
Time won't go back. The slow deterioration
Is how I know I'm mortal. We all are.
This time on Earth is merely a vacation;
The time we aren't is always greater far.
We cram so much into that life, but still
Death and decay both win. They always will.

Sunday, July 26, 2020

Alteration Finds

Should I approve
If all these changes
Or by remove
To distant ranges
Signal my
Objection to
The sudden cry
Of something new?
I might well flee
The altered state
But that I see
That if I wait
The change will grow
To status quo.

Saturday, July 25, 2020

Thunderstorm Gothic

On days like this the night is never far
Although we wish it were. When night arrives
It is unleavened by a single star;
The moon has disappeared. The little knives
Of street lamps cut across the gloom, but break
Against the darkness. Sounds are magnified.
Even the animals appear to make
The sound decision, now, to run and hide.
No one opens any door. The rain
Somehow falls silently, or soft enough
To let the others through. The silent strain
Becomes unbearable. The air feels tough.
On days and nights like this I too stay in
Best not to let it touch me on the skin.

Friday, July 24, 2020

Whether

When people spend too long together
They often seem to rub apart
As when the prickle of the weather 
Implies a thunderstorm will start:
The very thunder of dissension
Is fortold by lightning eyes;
The tears that fall out of suspension
Heralded by windy sighs.
The heated blasts of angry words
Are followed by the hail of fists;
In each case cautious cattle herds
Predict the change by being missed.
And as the summer squall blows past
So too these arguments don't last.

Tuesday, July 21, 2020

A La

I've never had a gift for imitation
For writing like I think that others thought;
I'm simply not that good at observation
At working out the way a word was wrought.
Instead of teasing out the tangled knot
Of what I've read, I simply cut right through;
I analyze the way it was begot
But to read well is not a route to do.
I do not claim my writing is all new
As if I were untouched by prior knowledge;
But I must write my lines without a cue
Not even that which I now teach in college.
Thus though I must profess myself well-read
The words I write come from the heart instead.

Saturday, July 18, 2020

Escape Artist

There have been days (there will be days) I plan
To run away and hide from everyone;
To make a new life under a new sun
And take a new name just because I can.
There was a time once when I almost ran:
When what was doing and what had been done
Became impossible; what I had begun
Had turned out nothing like when I began.
But since I stayed, and managed through the mess,
Since I found you, and joined your life with mine,
The plans I make are larger than before.
Now when I plan, I will not run unless
Your thoughts are folded into my design
And where I flee has room for one name more.

Saturday, July 11, 2020

Philosophy

Love is a comfort, deep within the soul,
A promise that whatever trouble comes
The partnership of love will make it whole
Even if the world is torn to crumbs.
It is a sense, held trusting in the heart,
That one thing stands despite the maelstrom's rage:
That anything that might be torn apart
Can be repaired if love is let to age.
Love is the relaxation of the mind,
The peace that lies behind the everyday
That whispers, when the world has been unkind
There is a place beyond the world to stay.
Love does not doubt or trust: it needs them not,
But sits beyond the seat of conscious thought.

Saturday, July 4, 2020

America

America is much misunderstood.
America is only an ideal.
America (like most things) is not real.
America is not a force for good.
America's a bombed-out neighborhood.
America's its own Achilles heel.
America has many wounds to heal;
America does little that it should.
America, my home, my native land;
America, of opportunity;
America, the settlers' demand:
America, from sea to shining sea.
America, so hard to understand;
America, harder, somehow, to be.

Friday, July 3, 2020

Humidity

The crushing air is warm and soft
And lures me down to sleep outside.
I cannot keep my head aloft;
My limbs lie low; I cannot hide
The way my eyelids droop. My skin
Feels tight, my hair all prickles,
The bugs that flit about begin
To chew on me--their eating tickles.
I hear the fireworks far out 
And wish that they were thunderous
The air is wet, the land a drought
So rainfall would be wonderous
But if I sleep and it should rain
I still believe I would complain.