Category Archives: Politics

Hurricane Donald

15 Replies

Hurricane Donald

What mighty wind blows hard out of Mar-A-Lago
up-ending facts like trailers in a trailer park
ripping the roofs off reputations
revealing the gyrations in the bedrooms below
hailing down bombast and innuendo
on the corrugated tin of truth
a wind that makes Ian and Fiona
look like that nice Scottish couple across the road
(Is she Irish?), the ones you should invite over for dinner
or is it just a storm in a tumbler
is it just Donald raving
in the cocktail hour of his years.

Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal

Goodbye Boris, Goodbye Liz, Hello Rishi!

19 Replies

Goodbye Boris, Goodbye Liz, Hello Rishi!

I have to say
as an Irish person
how proud and honored I am
that the United Kingdom has appointed a prime minister
whose first name is an anagram of “Irish”;
I know we and the English have had our troubles in the past
Troubles with a capital T
(the Plantation of Ulster…don’t get me started)
but the English are subtle people
not given to public displays of emotion
and this gesture is quintessentially English in its subtlety
it’s as if they are saying thank you for Father Ted
it brings a tear to my eye
it takes the oatmeal biscuit
so “Hello Rishi”
as they say in Ireland
“buachaill inniu, fear amarach”
or loosely translated from the Gaelic
“I hope your politics change soon”.

Taking part in OpenLink over at dverse

Photo : statue of Oscar Wilde in Merrion Square, Dublin.

The Beat Goes On But It’s A Different Beat

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(this is one from mid pandemic)

I think I made a mistake

baselines, fault lines , paradigm shifts
ignorance has been weaponized
what will we do, what will we do
when all the nouns are verbed?

I think I made a mistake
how is there still doubt in that sentence?
A man goes to a party
to get infected with a virus
in order to prove
that the virus is a hoax,
the man dies.
It’s hard not to be harsh.
Is this a new baseline,
a new low?
Is it an intelligence deficit?
Is it lack of education?
No, this is something different
this is a sea change
the beast has left Bethlehem
the malware has been activated
the human race has started to self-limit.
Whatever god, assembly of gods
or conglomerate of alien scientists
malevolent or benevolent
that designed this whole shebang
that opened this can of worms
has had enough
the malware has been activated
the fix is in
it’s past midnight and the eagle has flown
Aunt Mary is hanging out the washing
the human race has started to self-limit.

A man goes to a party
to get infected with a virus
in order to prove
that the virus is a hoax,
the man dies.

Sanaa over at dverse asks us to :

“For Today’s Poetics, I want you all to write in the style of the Beat Generation. Pour out the first thought, the first thing that comes to mind and let the words take you forward.

Feel free to write about darker (more under-rated) subjects. The aim here is to explore the “human condition,” and to write spontaneously. Shall we?”

I thought the above poem might fit.

(Thanks to Brendan over at earthweal for the original challenge: Observe shifting baselines in your world, in climate change, your nation’s governance, the pandemic. )

The Fallen (An update after hearing about Steve Bannon’s Conviction)

3 Replies

The Fallen 

Today I thought about Reince Priebus
not so much the man,
more the strange music of his name;
those slender vowels reversing
that echo of wince
the possible meanings
a salve, an ointment
put some Reince on that cut, son;
the Latinate portliness of Priebus
a writ to slap someone with – Habeas Priebus
a complicated skateboard manoeuvre
he executed a perfect reverse Priebus;
then I thought of Anthony, dear Anthony,
Scaramucci, Scaramucci
will you do the fandango,
you were not long with us
but still the smell of aftershave lingers
and it was you who let us know
about Steve Bannon’s auto fellatio,
alas, poor Steve
abandoned on the side of the road
like a rumpled sofa
a rumpled sofa smelling of yesterday’s sweat
and stale doctrine;
and what about Spicer and Huckabee
cartoon characters
Plucky and Angry
your souls will be in the repair shop
for some time to come.
They appear in waves,
the arrested –
Flynn, Cohen and Stone,
the ones who once were serious people –
McMaster, Kelly, Bolton.
In years to come when men and women gather
to talk of greatness
your names will be long forgotten.
The list of the fallen goes on and on
and still Humpty continues his slow and tortuous fall.

A different version of this poem appeared in Oddball Magazine

Hiram (Poem for Earthweal)

35 Replies

Hiram

Hiram likes to drink water
direct from the spigot
on the front wall of his house;
he hasn’t had to connect a hose
to that darn spigot
since he converted the lawn to artificial.
Good times.
In the evening,
he sits on his porch
staring out at the Christmas tree green of the lawn
drinking lite beer
and polishing his assault rifle,
this gives him comfort.

Not that he’s afraid,
he ain’t afraid of nuthin’,
he ain’t afraid of AOC
he ain’t afraid of Antifa
he ain’t afraid of that girl from Sweden
the one that never smiles
he’s vigilant, that’s all;
vigilance is of the essence.
He likes the sound of that,
maybe get a T shirt made
put that on the front,
‘G.I. – God Incarnate’ on the back.

No, he ain’t afraid of nuthin’,
but sometimes
in the early hours of the morning
he lies awake
his gut gurgling like a drain
as it processes
the Outback appetizer
of deep fried onion rings
that the waitress
piled high on his plate
like a jumble sale
of used Olympic symbols;
he lies awake
stalked by a fear
he will not name
the fear of being left behind,
left in the dust,
by the twenty first century.

This week I’m hosting the weekly challenge over at Earthweal (Title “Fiction? Don’t be a Stranger”). So head on over there and prepare to be challenged.

Also taking part in Open Link over at dverse


The Trucker Convoy Protesting Vaccine Mandates Crosses Burrard Street Bridge

9 Replies

The Trucker Convoy Protesting Vaccine Mandates Crosses Burrard Street Bridge

as seen from the park below
the trucks look like toy trucks
driven by children
which is partly true
given that the logic of their rhetoric
resembles that of a petulant child
and I’m being hard on petulant children

the blaring horns sound like
the dying groans of white male supremacy
the Canada geese look puzzled
the crows go crazy in the trees.

Taking part in open link weekend over at earthweal

Apunkalypse Now (A new movie by Francis Ford Cortina)

8 Replies

Apunkalypse Now

In a dystopian future
there’s rioting in cities and towns
all across the USA
and anyone who cares to
can own a semi-automatic weapon.
One fateful night
a seventeen year old baby-faced punk
called Kole
heads into town with his semi-automatic rifle
to restore order on The Streets of Somewhere,
by the end of the night
three people are dead.
Kole is arrested, tried and acquitted
in The Court of the White Over Caste.
He becomes a hero, an icon, an example
and soon young punks all across the USA
are starting to feel lucky.
(Spoiler Alert:
It’s not the Future).

Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal

Myron’s Dog.

19 Replies

Myron’s Dog

After Myron’s dog died
he experienced
what he would later come to call:
A Failure of Optimism.

It wasn’t just the loss of his dog
it was the pandemic, the anti-vaxxers,
the placards, the protests,
the rabid mobs.
He began to think in movie titles, book titles:
Dawn of the Dumb Ass
The Age of Idiocy
The Death of Logic.

And it wasn’t just the anti-vaxxers
It was Texas and its abortion legislation
Patriarchy’s Second Wind
The Great White American Male
coming up for air
spouting an acidic spume
of piss, vinegar and self-righteousness.

And it wasn’t just Texas
it was Afghanistan
the rise of the Taliban
the fall of Kabul
Welcome to The Fundament of Fundamentalism!
Hey Mister Taliban
Daylight comes and everybody wants to leave home.

And then one morning
Myron woke up,
walked out the door
and got himself another dog.
Some things can be fixed.

Taking part in Open Link Night over at dverse

Ironic Distancing (with bonus haiku)…redux.

39 Replies

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Ironic Distancing

The mind wanders
I think of a word that rhymes with ‘banker’
and marvel at how
in the middle of a global crisis
my brain still tilts
towards the trivial, the juvenile.
I try a sound poem
panic, pandemic, pandemonium
but it’s missing something,
panache, perhaps.
I make up a joke involving Peter Pan
but decide now is not the time to share it.
I detect the late onset of maturity
and feel depressed.
I text some friends,
we try to out-snide each other
but after a while
we are all chewing on the same bone.
I’m besieged by an idiocy of idioms –
the whole nine yards
the whole kit and caboodle
and that’s only the tip of the iceberg.
I re-assess my relationship with surfaces
I can no longer count on
that counter to lean on,
and as someone inclined
to whistle past the graveyard
walk past the writing on the wall
I have to admit
that the object in the mirror
was a lot closer
than it first appeared.

I write a haiku

four in the morning
moon shining on toilet bowl
porcelain pathway.

Eat your heart out! Basho!

Victoria over at dverse asks us to write a soliloquy incorporating one or more poetic devices, this one is heavy on alliteration with a bit of internal rhyme. It was previously published here, mid- pandemic last year.

Ted’s less than Excellent Adventure (quadrille)

20 Replies

Ted’s less than Excellent Adventure

thousands of turtles
are stunned by the cold
off the Texas Coast,
the lights go out,
the lone star flickers,
Republicans tilt at windmills.
Ted Cruz flees to Mexico
but returns prematurely
after a less than excellent adventure
chastened, but still oilier than thou.

The challenge over at dverse is to write a 44 word poem (quadrille) incorporating the word “go”.

Me, Mike Pence and the Magaleptic Mob

15 Replies

Me, Mike Pence and the Magaleptic Mob

the only one between me and the magaleptic mob,
a zaftig army in dollar store camouflage,
is Mike Pence

their fists are raised to the spacious skies
there’s spittle on their lips
anger and atavism in their eyes

this does not bother me
a rock hits the wrought iron gate behind me
this also does not bother me
I’m staring into an open cooler
containing ten tall cans of craft pale ale
and a bag of frozen shrimp
and I can see that the ice is melting
way faster than I expected
this bothers me

Go through the gate, Mike yells
Go through the gate
But Mike, I reply, I need more ice for the shrimp!
Forget the fucking shrimp, Mike yells
Go through the gate
and I’m thinking,
Mrs. Pence would not like that kind of language

I look down at the shrimp
and imagine them curled and pink on my plate
with a dash of soy
a dash of sriracha
another rock hits the wrought iron gates
they swing open onto a long driveway
that leads up to a large mansion
which I know in the strange logic of dreams
is a house of consequence
I know this is the house of Richard Nixon

I turn to Mike who is bleeding from the forehead
and clutching the nuclear football
like a quarterback waiting for someone to run a pattern
and I say
Hey Mike, I wonder if Mr. Nixon has a freezer.

Taking part in Open Link over at dverse

Boris Johnson at the G7 (The Boris Trilogy Part 2)

6 Replies

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A trip down memory lane…

Boris Johnson at the G7 

Can’t believe I’m here.
Oh! The joy of dissembling!
Japes, pranks and capers!

What is Macron looking at?
I think Donald might like me.

There’s Melania!
Those cheekbones, the north face of
the bloody Eiger,

scale her promontories, what!
No time for rumpy pumpy,

lots to do! Trudeau
is smirking, colonial
prat! I think Merkel

wants to spank me, go nanny!
Concentrate! Now where was I?

Is Joe?

10 Replies

Is Joe
the rainbow
after the storm
the light
at the end of
the tunnel
the bar man
who will create
a cocktail
that is better
than the current mix
of braggadocio and bile,
garnished with a licorice stick
of lies, the Orange Russian?
Is he the man
to drive the sedan of democracy
straight down the middle of the road
to remind us of what
we used to regard as order?
Or does he have to be that?
It would be enough to be
the ornament on the hood
of that sedan,
because the thing is
he doesn’t have to be the thing
others can take care of the thing
he just needs to be
a symbol of the thing.
Is Joe
the rainbow
after the storm
the light
at the end of
the tunnel?
Jesus, I hope so.

The challenge from Brendan over at earthweal is “Write about storms and rainbows from whatever vantage seems most appropriate to you.”

I think I made a mistake

11 Replies

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I think I made a mistake

baselines, fault lines , paradigm shifts
ignorance has been weaponized
what will we do, what will we do
when all the nouns are verbed?

I think I made a mistake
how is there still doubt in that sentence?
A man goes to a party
to get infected with a virus
in order to prove
that the virus is a hoax,
the man dies.
It’s hard not to be harsh.
Is this a new baseline,
a new low?
Is it an intelligence deficit?
Is it lack of education?
No, this is something different
this is a sea change
the beast has left Bethlehem
the malware has been activated
the human race has started to self-limit.
Whatever god, assembly of gods
or conglomerate of alien scientists
malevolent or benevolent
that designed this whole shebang
that opened this can of worms
has had enough
the malware has been activated
the fix is in
it’s past midnight and the eagle has flown
Aunt Mary is hanging out the washing
the human race has started to self-limit.

A man goes to a party
to get infected with a virus
in order to prove
that the virus is a hoax,
the man dies.

 

Brendan over at earthweal poses the challenge: Observe shifting baselines in your world, in climate change, your nation’s governance, the pandemic. 

The Fallen (2020)

11 Replies

 

 

 

The Fallen (2020)

Today I thought about Reince Priebus
not so much the man,
more the strange music of his name;
those slender vowels reversing
that echo of wince
the possible meanings
a salve, an ointment
put some Reince on that cut, son;
the Latinate portliness of Priebus
a writ to slap someone with – Habeas Priebus
a complicated skateboard manoeuvre
he executed a perfect reverse Priebus;
then I thought of Anthony, dear Anthony,
Scaramucci, Scaramucci
will you do the fandango,
you were not long with us
but still the smell of aftershave lingers
and it was you who let us know
about Steve Bannon’s auto fellatio,
alas, poor Steve
abandoned on the side of the road
like a rumpled sofa
a rumpled sofa smelling of yesterday’s sweat
and stale doctrine;
and what about Spicer and Huckabee
cartoon characters
Plucky and Angry
your souls will be in the repair shop
for some time to come.
They appear in waves,
the arrested –
Flynn, Cohen and Stone,
the ones who once were serious people –
McMaster, Kelly, Bolton.
In years to come when men and women gather
to talk of greatness
your names will be long forgotten.
The list of the fallen goes on and on
and still Humpty sits on his wall
and still we wait for Humpty’s Great Fall.

A different version of this poem appeared in Oddball Magazine

Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal . https://earthweal.com/2020/07/03/earthweal-open-link-weekend-27/

The Path Forward

10 Replies

 

 

The Path Forward

no dumbass in a MAGA hat
is going to solve this one
all the bluster you can muster
will do nothing at all,
remember that guy
who got first in the class
the one wearing glasses
who never got the girl
he’s the one who will save our asses
so get out of the way
you won’t be missed
this one will be solved by scientists.

 

The challenge over at earthweal is to write a poem about The Crossroad we are at. Well, this is possibly not the subtlest poem ever written but hey…..these are not subtle times.

Ironic Distancing (with bonus haiku)

9 Replies

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Ironic Distancing

The mind wanders
I think of a word that rhymes with ‘banker’
and marvel at how
in the middle of a global crisis
my brain still tilts
towards the trivial, the juvenile.
I try a sound poem
panic, pandemic, pandemonium
but it’s missing something,
panache, perhaps.
I make up a joke involving Peter Pan
but decide now is not the time to share it.
I detect the late onset of maturity
and feel depressed.
I text some friends,
we try to out-snide each other
but after a while
we are all chewing on the same bone.
I’m besieged by an idiocy of idioms –
the whole nine yards
the whole kit and caboodle
and that’s only the tip of the iceberg.
I re-assess my relationship with surfaces
I can no longer count on
that counter to lean on,
and as someone inclined
to whistle past the graveyard
walk past the writing on the wall
I have to admit
that the object in the mirror
was a lot closer
than it first appeared.

I write a haiku

four in the morning
moon shining on toilet bowl
porcelain pathway.

Watch your back! Basho!

 

Taking part in open link weekend over at earthweal.

 

Watching CNN (a sort of rant)

9 Replies

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Anderson, Chris and Don and their assembled pundits are discussing the assassination of General Soleimani, the Iranian general. They all agree that he was a “bad actor”, a “bad guy”. They don’t say “bad hombre”,but it’s knocking at the door. This appears to be sufficient to warrant execution, it’s the timing and ongoing strategy they are concerned about.
Why I ask myself are they talking like characters in a 1950’s western?
Why are they talking like school kids?
Bad guys, good guys – “goodies and baddies”.

Back in the Classroom:

Teacher, by the end of the major combat phase of the Iraq war, 7,419 Iraqi civilians had been killed, primarily by U.S. air-and-ground forces, is George Bush Junior a bad guy, a bad actor, a bad hombre?

No, child, every American president is good.

Teacher, were those innocent civilians “collateral damage” or “victims of terror”?

That is a complex and morally confusing question, child. Here in America we do not like confusion.

Teacher, why do the American media continue to refer to the Canadians killed in the Ukraine Airlines crash as Iranians.

It’s less confusing that way, see above.

Teacher, is President Trump a bad guy, a bad actor, a bad hombre?

No, child, President Trump is a liar, a racist, possibly a crook and possibly a sexual predator but he is not a bad guy, a bad actor, a bad hombre.

Teacher, why are Anderson, Chris and Don so angry with him? Why the sanctimonious, po-faced editorials?

Because he is un-statesmanlike and because they have become lazy and are content to trot out the same tired outrage every day of the week. Their ambition is limited, they are happy just to be “not Hannity”.

But teacher, they seem like nice guys.

Your point is?

Boris Johnson at the G7 (a sort of triple tanka)

6 Replies

 

IMG_0269 (10)

Boris Johnson at the G7 

Can’t believe I’m here.
Oh! The joy of dissembling!
Japes, pranks and capers!

What is Macron looking at?
I think Donald might like me.

There’s Melania!
Those cheekbones, the north face of
the bloody Eiger,

scale her promontories, what!
No time for rumpy pumpy,

lots to do! Trudeau
is smirking, colonial
prat! I think Merkel

wants to spank me, go nanny!
Concentrate! Now where was I?