Fortunate Son (Creedence and Donald T)
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Tag Archives: politics
Anderson Cooper’s Hair (in this ever changing world)
Anderson Cooper’s Hair
There’s something comforting
about Anderson Cooper’s hair
its quietude
its insouciance
its unabashed whiteness
no Clooney dusting of grey
no Pavarotti boot polish black
just plain white
lightly cropped
a hint of a comb over, maybe
but that’s ok
and it does not move
a Midwest tornado
vile invective
a blast of foul air
from the president’s mouth
nothing moves Anderson Cooper’s hair;
to misquote Paul McCartney
and triple down on a preposition
in this ever changing world
in which we live in,
there’s something
comforting about that.
Muskerberg and The Toddler King
Muskerberg and The Toddler King
The rough beast is leaving Bethlehem
Musk Ox and Meta Morf
joined at the hip
their android stares
fixed on the horizon
slouching into twenty twenty five.
And all across the world
lonely men light up their lap tops
and search for unverified facts
formerly known as “lies”.
Meanwhile the Toddler King sleeps soundly
dreaming that he’s on an ice floe
off the coast of Greenland.
In the dream he owns that ice floe
and seals honk
in what he interprets to be approval.
Taking part in OpenLink over at dverse
Musk and Ramaswamy (Department Of Giant Egos)
Musk and Ramaswamy
(Department Of Giant Egos)
This just in from the Dow (Department of Wordplay).
Lately I’m seeing anagrams everywhere
DOGE
E god
E dog
Elon
NoEl , NoEl
LEon
Leon Musk and the Musk Rats
Tesla
stale
stale Musk
Musk Oil
Apply daily to improve your efficiency
but not your dance moves
and then there’s Ramaswamy
almost an anagram for
“warm yams”
almost but not quite
Vivek…sur le K vive?
how about
yr mama saw?
Nope it’s not happening
he’s outta here
Besides there’s only room for one giant ego in any department anywhere
yes look out Donald Don Lad
Elon is a LonE Musketeer.
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
Does Anyone Remember Reince Priebus?
This poem was written back in the first reign of King Donald and now that he is naming a new collection of fall guys I thought it would be worth one more revival.
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 now against all odds
another crew is climbing aboard Starship Donald.
A different version of this poem appeared in Oddball Magazine
Post-Election Riddle and The Trickle Down
Post –Election Riddle
If a democracy elects
a threat to democracy
is that self-harm?
The Trickle Down
Donald wins
and the Dow goes priapic
more money in the pockets of the working man
NOT
at best a trickle down
a leakage
from the anus of capitalism.
Taking part in Open Link over at dverse.
The Dryer Vent Invasion (Again)
The Dryer Vent Invasion
Last night I dreamt
that Jared Kushner and Stephen Miller
had entered my basement
through the dryer vent,
maybe “entered” is the wrong word
it was more an “insinuation”,
a slithering, under the vent flap
down the plastic vent hose
and into the dryer drum
where they paused briefly
to cough up some lint
before pushing open the dryer door
and oozing out onto the basement floor.
In the morning I went down to check the basement
feeling more than a little anxious.
it was empty, nothing had changed.
I sensed movement
out of the corner of my right eye
I turned, but there was no one there.
I sensed movement
out of the corner of my left eye
I turned, again there was no one there
but there was a smell
not the usual one, from that sock
abandoned at the bottom of my gym bag
this was rancid, pungent, acrid, fetid, halitotic
with a hint of damp weasel…….
the smell of venal ambition.
Jared is back in the news again, so I thought I would give this one another run.
Mitch McConnell looks back one more time before the ship sails off
Mitch McConnell looks back one more time before the ship sails off
Mitch stares in from the murky depths
an oxygen tank strapped to his back,
his lugubrious visage
fills the porthole
he removes his oxygen mask
a bubble escapes from his mouth
and floats upwards
his wattles sway like kelp
in the shifting currents
he has the detached look
of a man examining a museum exhibit
another bubble escapes upwards
he turns and kicks for the surface
his sagging buttocks
pale but somehow luminous
Is it Time to put Woke the Word to Bed ?
Is it Time to put Woke the Word to Bed ?
I have a conservative friend who, lately, has started to use Woke the Word a lot.
Every time he uses it, he wags his fingers above his head to indicate inverted commas. Sometimes he’ll give me a conspiratorial wink.
The wink confuses me. What are we conspiring about? And the air quotes, who is he quoting? Or do they mean “so-called”, as in my boss asked me to take my laptop with me on my “vacation”.
I asked him what he meant by “woke” and he was flummoxed. He mumbled something about pronouns, cancel culture, activists, political correctness. I explained to him that it was African-American slang for being alert to signs of racism, it came out of the Black Lives Matter movement and that being anti-woke technically means that one thinks one should not be alert to signs of racist behavior.
This did not help.
He had the notion that the woke crowd had it in for him in some way. When asked who the woke crowd are, again confusion….the left, activists, progressives…who knows. So I ask is all activism bad, is progress bad, no that’s not what he means.
I think what he means is that the world is changing in a way that threatens him, the old assumptions do not stand. The arbitrary superior status he assumes because he’s an educated, upper middle class white male is no longer automatically acknowledged, taken as read.
And it’s that woke crowd who are doing it to him.
As history tells us …when a word or phrase is coopted by conservative white males, well that word is no longer groovy, far out, outta sight, cool ,hip; particularly when they think they are the first to discover it.
Air quotes… for fuck sake….
Yes it is time to put Woke The Word to bed.
Donald The Toddler King Part 5
The Toddler King Part 5
5 a.m.
the toddler king
checks his twitter feed
access denied
it’s quiet now
but all last night
all he could hear
was the squeak and rustle
of rats leaving the ship
he stares out into the murky depths
Mitch McConnell swims by
an oxygen tank strapped to his back,
his lugubrious visage
fills the porthole
he removes his oxygen mask
a bubble escapes from his mouth
and floats upwards
his wattles sway like kelp
in the shifting currents
he has the detached look
of a man examining a museum exhibit
another bubble escapes upwards
he turns and kicks for the surface
his sagging buttocks
pale but somehow luminous
Am I dead?
The toddler king wonders
I can’t be dead
I’m absolutely not dead
If I say I’m not dead
I’m not dead.
Hey, what’s Ted Cruz doing out there
I thought this was a Cruz ship!
See, I made a joke
I can’t be dead!
Hurricane Donald
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
Oh Say, Can You See? (an anthem of sorts) redux
Oh say, can you see?
Oh say, can you see
that beacon of hope
guttering
in the magaleptic breeze
Oh say, can you see
the white horse
has lost its rider.
Oh say, can you see
by the dawn’s early light
how God’s face changes
with the angle we choose.
Myron’s Dog.
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
Rugged Individual in a Cowboy Hat
Rugged Individual in a Cowboy Hat
He weighs about 300 lbs
is wearing a cowboy hat
and an XXXL tee-shirt,
made by an underpaid worker
in a communist country.
This paragon of rugged individualism
this zaftig freedom fighter
this ersatz John Wayne
is telling the interviewer
he doesn’t believe in vaccination passports
because, you know, I mean
it’s a threat to our personal freedom
if we go down that road
what’s next
and I’m thinking
yes there are slopes out there
and yes they are slippery
what next indeed…
driver’s licenses
birth certificates
visas to enter countries
security checks in airports
customs
concealed weapons licenses
but most of all I’m thinking
God help the horse
God help the horse.
Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal
The Toddler King Part 5
The Toddler King Part 5
5 a.m.
the toddler king
checks his twitter feed
access denied
it’s quiet now
but all last night
all he could hear
was the squeak and rustle
of rats leaving the ship
he stares out into the murky depths
Mitch McConnell swims by
an oxygen tank strapped to his back,
his lugubrious visage
fills the porthole
he removes his oxygen mask
a bubble escapes from his mouth
and floats upwards
his wattles sway like kelp
in the shifting currents
he has the detached look
of a man examining a museum exhibit
another bubble escapes upwards
he turns and kicks for the surface
his sagging buttocks
pale but somehow luminous
Am I dead?
The toddler king wonders
I can’t be dead
I’m absolutely not dead
If I say I’m not dead
I’m not dead.
Hey, what’s Ted Cruz doing out there
I thought this was a Cruz ship!
See, I made a joke
I can’t be dead!
Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal
The Dryer Vent Invasion (poem)
The Dryer Vent Invasion
Last night I dreamt
that Jared Kushner and Stephen Miller
had entered my basement
through the dryer vent,
maybe “entered” is the wrong word
it was more an “insinuation”,
a slithering, under the vent flap
down the plastic vent hose
and into the dryer drum
where they paused briefly
to cough up some lint
before pushing open the dryer door
and oozing out onto the basement floor.
In the morning I went down to check the basement
feeling more than a little anxious.
it was empty, nothing had changed.
I sensed movement
out of the corner of my right eye
I turned, but there was no one there.
I sensed movement
out of the corner of my left eye
I turned, again there was no one there
but there was a smell
not the usual one, from that sock
abandoned at the bottom of my gym bag
this was rancid, pungent, acrid, fetid, halitotic
with a hint of damp weasel
the smell of venal ambition
the smell of distilled evil
one hundred per cent proof.
Taking part in Open Link Weekend over at earthweal
Dog in a Tartan Skirt (Redux)
Dog in a Tartan Skirt
There’s a dog wearing a tartan skirt
outside the window of Starbuck’s;
a tartan skirt, a belt, and a knitted white sweater.
Its little dog legs are moving frantically
on the wet pavement,
while across the slick road
and the sodden green park
the ocean sits
like a slab of lead
having clearly decided
to take some time off,
no crashing on the shore today.
South of the border
America blunders around
trying to remember
where it parked
that big ass car
that everyone admired
and envied.
The people look to God
but God, once again,
is moving in mysterious ways
and I, for one, wish He would knock it off,
could He not for once in His eternal life,
clarify something?
I mean, for fuck sake,
there’s a dog wearing a tartan skirt
outside the window of Starbuck’s.
Taking part in Open Link Night over at dverse.
Also taking part on Open Link Weekend over at Earthweal.
Issue #17 Vapid Magazine
Issue #17 Vapid Magazine
In Issue #17, coming to a newsstand nowhere near you, we discuss..
The environment, it’s everywhere
Our environment correspondent, Jordan Shallowditch, is away on vacation so our celebrity watcher and gossip columnist, Simon Shallowpond is picking up the slack, he offers this twitter friendly poem:
Plastics? What Plastics?
no need to fret
no need to fuss
all is well
‘cos Kristen Bell’s
got a bamboo toothbrush.
Well done, Simon!
The Oscars
Our movie critic, Georgina Shallowglass, discusses the Oscars and asks the question:
Why would anyone divorce Adam Driver?
Plus, she describes that epiphanic, that life-altering moment when she realised that Jane Austen didn’t write Little Women (it was those American accents).
Politics
It’s been a busy year so far in politics and our political correspondent, Jonathan Shallowpit, asks the controversial question:
Did the founding fathers fuck it up?
..and if not, how come the semi-literate son of a billionaire, with bad hair and a genius for marketing dumb ideas could destroy the whole shebang , the whole house of cards by simply saying :” Nah, I’m not going to do that”.
Footnote
Jonathan, I’m afraid, will be leaving Vapid Magazine. A number of his co-workers have complained that he is making them think too much, resulting in headaches and a toxic working environment.
Vapid Magazine, home of all things vapid!
Participating in Open Link Night over at dverse , check them out!
Bones of Contention 2 (poem)
Bones of Contention
Bones to pick
bones to chew on
Anderson, Chris and Don
but there are no metrics to measure by
so the discussions drag on and on
and the screen splits into two heads
and the screen splits into four heads
and the screen splits into eight heads
a pundit arrives
a pundit leaves
a pundit gets indignant
a pundit gets emotional
a pundit gets that gotcha smirk
there is talk of smoke and fire
there not been one without the other
and I see this distraction of pundits
this deflection of pundits
this confusion of pundits
standing looking at the horizon
across an open plain,
oblivious, while behind them
Rome burns.
Oh Say, Can You See? (an anthem of sorts)
Oh say, can you see?
Oh say, can you see
that beacon of hope
guttering
in the magaleptic breeze
Oh say, can you see
the white horse
has lost its rider.
Oh say, can you see
by the dawn’s early light
how God’s face changes
with the angle we choose.
Trumplings (A Retrospective and a quote from T.S. Eliot)
The other day, I was looking back on the number of Donald Trump related posts on this blog and a pattern emerged. In 2015, there were 3 posts; in 2016, 10 posts; in 2017, 23 posts; in 2018, 19 posts; in 2019, 2 posts so far.
That’s when I thought of T.S. Eliot:
“And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned wriggling on a wall”
It seems, looking at the above stats, that in my mind, at least, Donald has been formulated and there is little more to be said creatively, even the outrage has become stale. He has the approval of over 40% of American voters and maybe now that is the subject, the man himself has been defined and will not change.
These are the Trump posts I had most fun writing , they rely a bit more (I think) on language rather than straight polemic. They are arranged somewhat in chronological sequence
“Agent Orange has a dark Moment” was published in Rat’s Ass Review” ,and “Donald Trump – On Reflection” was published in “Oddball Magazine“. “Trumputin” was published in Anti-Heroin Chic .
Inauguration
it
does
not
augur
well.
Donald’s Early Days
A farrago of fiascos,
banishments and bans;
weekends at Mar-a-Lago
the world in his hands.
Agent Orange has a Dark Moment
Do you know who I miss? Jeb Bush. I miss Jeb Bush. He was my first. When I hit him with that low energy jibe and he fell apart and all the Bush family could not put Humpty together again, I knew I was on to something. Then Little Marco and Lyin’ Ted, I miss them too. But most of all, I miss Hillary, Crooked Hillary. Man, she was tough, had me on the ropes. It took Comey and Vlad, that pointy headed villain, to get me back on my feet. I was nearly out for the count, which might not have been a bad thing. Who needs this shit! I should give Vlad a call, I’m a bit worried -there’s no such thing as a free hack.
Reince Priebus – what kind of fucking name is that? It sounds like bad news from the doctor. “I’m sorry, Donald, you have a Reince Priebus on your rectum and it doesn’t look good”. Ha, I just made myself laugh. And Bannon, I’ve seen sofas on the side of the road in better shape than that rumpled fucker. Spice Box? Hardest job in the world – explaining the unexplainable. That Melissa Mc.Carthy just slays me. How come all the cool people are on the other side? Who have I got? Ryan and Pence? Bland and Blander? Where did Pence come from anyway with his brush cut and his antediluvian politics? The best surgeons in the world couldn’t remove the poker from that guy’s ass. Antediluvian, you didn’t expect that did you?
Talking of cool, I should give Barack a call, ask him down to Florida for a game of golf; check his birth certificate again (Joking! How I miss those days). Man, I hate this fucking White House furniture, is it Friday yet?
Haiku for Donald
petulant pillock
postcranial curmudgeon
bombastic buffoon.
On Reflection…. Donald Trump
America has given birth
to a giant orange child
a zaftig infant Gulliver
striding the ravaged earth
of his own imagination
trampling whole villages
swallowing villagers whole.
Trumputin (a romance)
Don loves Vlad
Vlad loves Don
Love as big as
A nuclear bomb.
Front door, back door,
Kremlin, tower
Nuclear love
Nuclear power.
The Toddler King (excerpt)
5 am. in America
the toddler king
checks his Twitter feed
in the empty parking lot
of a big box store
a plastic bag pirouettes
on the halitotic breeze
national monuments
fear for their lives
the adjectives – good, bad, great-
drop in value again
the toddler king
picks a fight with himself.
Anderson Cooper’s Hair (updated)
Anderson Cooper’s Hair
There’s something comforting
about Anderson Cooper’s hair
its quietude
its insouciance
its unabashed whiteness
no Paul Manafort chocolate brown
no Clooney dusting of grey
no Pavarotti boot polish black
just plain white
lightly cropped
a hint of a comb over, maybe
but that’s ok
and it does not move
Hurricane Barry
a Midwest tornado
vile invective
a blast of foul air
from the president’s mouth
nothing moves Anderson Cooper’s hair;
to misquote Paul McCartney
and triple down on a preposition
in this ever changing world
in which we live in,
there’s something
comforting about that.
Children held in camps at the US border…(haiku)
Children held in camps at the US border…
the sultan of spin
in all his orange glory
can’t polish this one.
This was first posted a year ago, I guess I was wrong.
Poems that I had most fun writing in 2018,……2:Dog in a Tartan Skirt (Edit)
Over the next few days, I will be posting poems that I had the most fun writing in 2018. They may not have got the most views or likes, but they are (perhaps) the poems I found to be the most satisfying.
Dog in a Tartan Skirt
There’s a dog wearing a tartan skirt
outside the window of Starbuck’s;
a tartan skirt, a belt, and a knitted white sweater;
its little dog legs are moving frantically
on the wet pavement,
while across the slick road
and the sodden green park
the ocean sits
like a slab of lead,
no crashing on the shore today.
South of the border
America blunders around
trying to remember
where it parked
that big car
that everyone admired
and envied.
The people look to God
but God, once again,
is moving in mysterious ways;
I, for one, wish He would knock it off,
enough already with the mystery
could He not for once in His eternal life,
clarify something?
I mean, for fuck sake,
there’s a dog wearing a tartan skirt
outside the window of Starbuck’s.
Donald’s Early Days (Redux)
Donald’s Early Days
A farrago of fiascoes,
banishments and bans;
weekends at Mar-A-Lago
the world in his hands.
I thought I would update this one for dVerse’s open link Thursday ( I know, it’s Friday). Even though it was written in the early day’s of the Toddler King’s reign, I think unfortunately it still applies.
Stopdraggingthepanda 