Tag Archives: elections

EARLY MORNING

Photo by Tara Winstead on Pexels.com

Even the sun 

has difficulty rising

above the cold clouds.

We gather our strength

like warm blankets against hate.

Soon to be knocked down.

While the world watches,

holding our breaths in its hands,

we wonder and weep.

The past, not prologue

but warning, of what’s to come,

shouts out its last gasp.

This, this too, shall pass.

Spring tumbles frozen hatred,

melts evil away.

Rise up, Sun, and shine.

Rise up sisters and brothers of mine.

It is time. It is time.

Now, hear the alarm.

It is past time to awake.

No need to tremble nor shake.

Gather the courage our many blessings have built.

and renew rights once promised,

now eager to be fulfilled.

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BALANCE OF POWER

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Nature restores balance

upset by human hands

on air and sea and land.

Government becomes unbalanced

when leaders fail to understand

no government can serve us

when controlled by a single man.

No single party can control

a seamless governance of the whole.

Power unbalanced is doomed to fail.

History and Nature tell the tale.

Diversity is the golden rule of life,

counteracting hidden strife

as it strives to interact and share

what keeps the planet alive and fair,

what makes us glad to be alive.

Cooperation is not just wise.

It is the seed of all that grows.

It is the only means Nature knows

to grow the wheat and the rose,

to water the farmland and dry the bog,

to cool summer heat and fire winter’s log,

to spread seeds on the breeze of dawn

and weight the wind blowing too strong.

We have run away from Nature far too long.

We have forgotten to listen to Nature’s song.


We have been singing a discordant tune

Photo by Kampus Production on Pexels.com

to instruments so loud, the song is ruined.

But Nature always restores balance.

It is the base note of Nature’s parlance.

Take off your shoes and walk in the grass.

Feel the freedom you feared lost in the past.

Turn your face into the wind and hold tight.

Feel the freedom you feared lost beyond your sight.

Wade in puddles catching raindrops on your tongue.

Feel the freedom you feared lost and with hands wrung.

We fear we have no way to save our nation.

But Nature gives us a new generation

every spring and through every season

Nature restores our world and our reason.

Balance of Power is the song of the hour.

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MY FELLOW AMERICANS

MY FELLOW AMERICANS

I hold my tongue.

It takes strength I do not have.

Whimpers escape

On shattered breaths,

In silent screams.

The fight worries my soul,

Battle weary and choking,

On words held tight inside.

Once the scream begins

I doubt I could stop.

I wait for your speech.

I yearn for your promise

To stop the authoritarian

Who has taken over our house,

Emptied its vaults,

Stolen its wealth,

Sold its power

To the highest bidders.

So, I write. That I can do

While I wait for you.

To me, this nothing new.

Do you believe me now?

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IT IS ALWAYS IN THE NUMBERS

Reports indicate attendance at NO KINGS events is somewhere between 5.2-8.2 billion persons. It is possibly much larger than any assumed count. For example. If one counts those registered with organizations who counted attendees, one simply gets a flat number of those who bothered to join through the organization. I registered and reported my attendance. By the time I attended three more persons joined me. They remain uncounted officially. I am sure this is true for families and friends of most attendees.

In the past, for individual rallies, law enforcement using drones mapped the crowd and made estimates using “so many persons per square inch” of their photos to create crowd attendance figures. While major big cities may have done so, mine did not. Local news did not. nor did Law enforcement in my locality. I am certain this happened in much of small town America. So when these numbers are posted, assume they are sorely undercounted. 

Nevertheless, no matter the total count, the wide extent of events across the country in red and blue states and cities, in small hamlets, on rural roadway intersections, outside nursing homes and senior care facilities is significant. And, such small groups are likely not part of the count. Yet, the fact they showed such resilience and disgust for what is happening and took to the streets gives us cause to hope we can face down fascism and remove those traitors to our core American beliefs and to our Constitution from office; from School Board, Board of Health, City and County commissioners, mayors and city council, to Congress and the White House. 

Local politics is sometime hard to unravel, especially for races where platitudes replace true positions and no party affiliation is required. We have tools those who came before us did not have, the internet and email addresses. Ask candidates for specific position statements. If they do not answer or provide gibberish, there is your answer. Be an informed voter. Help register new voters. Help motivate and take voters to the polls. We must now march to the polls as we marched through the streets. As Winston Churchill said, “This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. It is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Now, the hard work begins. Please remember the joy you felt on No Kings Day and let it propel you to even greater efforts. We now know for certain, what we believed. We are not alone.

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DECONSTRUCTION

Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025

The streets were lined for blocks on end.

Signs reminded all who rejoiced to attend

Why they walked and talked and smiled and waved

At passing cars who braved delays

While drivers honked horns and shouted out

“Vote him out and make it a rout!”

Costumed critters danced to our delight

Knowing their freedom would give him a fright.

Deconstruct the lies we have been told.

Deconstruct the narrative being sold.

Deconstruct the bullie’s hold.

Deconstruct institutional mold.

Gather in peace the young and the old.

Stronger are you, more wise, more bold.

Deconstruct so we can rebuild

What he has destroyed with his minions’ lack of skill.

We know how to do this, and more.

We have done it many times before.

Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025
Columbus, Ohio 10-18-2025

My thanks to my friends in Clintonville area of Columbus who helped me attend this moment of patriots’ challenge to the con men robbing the USA of its power, wealth, ideals and humanity. The lack of media coverage was appalling. The misrepresentation of attendance numbers cannot be challenged when media fails to provide images of the gatherings. A local station covered it AFTER it was over and crowds had dispersed. Another stated hundreds attended when it was actually thousands. We are here. We are resisting. We are going nowhere until the despotism and kidnapping of people and the Supreme Court, universities, news organizations, social media outlets, medical and public health Institutions… even our very language and the meaning of words and phrases has been brought to an end and freedom restored.

We shall not be silenced.

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NO KINGS DAY

Acrylic on canvass by Louise Annarino

The day begins with signs

Of all that any patriot finds

In need of expression

To resist oppression.

We line the streets

Feet deep

Only to meet

Aggression

From those who seek

Our suppression.

Gerrymandered districts

Are incomplete,

Unable to meet

Fair representation,

Denying the nation

one person one vote,

Intimidation afloat

In every state.

We pray it is not too late.

We pray our efforts matter.

We pray our mad-as-hatter

Administration

Stops destroying our beloved nation.

We sing. We dance. We shout.

This is what democracy is about.

No kings today.

No kings in any way.

No kings over courts’ justice.

No kings over any of us.

Every king eventually falls.

We do not want a king at all.

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SILENCE

Photo by PUSCAU DANIEL FLORIN on Pexels.com

The walk around the neighborhood is strangely silent.

Cicadas have ceased their songs of warning.

Birds flock south on gentle winds 

leaving the yard yearning for music.

Butterflies still sing with quiet wings 

few can hear.

Gnats and flies loosely lie low 

as caterpillars hold on tight

to leaves of flowers seeding through colder nights.

The angle of the sun has moved us

as we turn around a sun now calmed.

Its bright displays over too-hot days are over-done.

The silence grows as the cold days come on.

Longer shadows of neglect disclose

the weeds who hid in too-bright light.

We now face ever-longer nights.

Is this the calm before winter’s storms?

Are we watching the loss of every norm?

Or have we become so compliant

we fail to even notice the silence?

The neighborhood is strangely silent

as I keep vigil, and hold fast against violence.

Silence, silence. So much uneasy silence

one wants to scream and shout so loud

windows open wide in surprise 

to see what all the fuss is about.

Footsteps march around the block.

Even they are too silent to unlock

the energy sapped by summer’s too-hot heat.

We are just too tired to compete

with the silence, silence. So much silence.

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WHAT’S NEXT ?

Photo by Mikhail Nilov on Pexels.com

Organizing is agonizing.

Perhaps this is why 

so few even try.

Door to door

volunteers implore

a moment of your time.

Clipboards held close

to register you to vote,

and finally take a stand

on what matters to you.

Citizenship is not exciting.

there are no trophies awarded

for showing up to vote.

Time spent is the only fee

to stand in line and show I.D.

You get what you pay for

but so much more a say for

a government you choose

to serve your every need.

Then why must volunteers plead

for your attention, as they speed

to meet deadlines for signatures

to place a choice on a ballot.

Does any of it matter?

Look around you now.

And what you see, I vow,

will bring you to your knees.

Too long have you ignored

the politics of greed.

Register then vote

in every single election.

Believe me when I say

voting is your only protection.

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FREE THE STRAWBERRIES

Louise’s strawberry garden fenced to keep out chipmunks, squirrels,racoons,deer,rabbits,skunks and a variety of birds; allowing in rain, helpful pollinators, and insect enemies of other harmful insects. Rest assured the gate will be turned right side up and our American garden will once again flourish and produce sweet fruit. Patience and effort, constant weeding out those harming the garden. It takes time and is well worth the effort.

The fence is placed all around

The strawberries are in the ground.

The gate is upside down.

The harvest will be delayed

Dismantling what we made

hour by our, day by day.

Chaos alway brings change.

Gardens too rigorously defended

make fences necessarily upended

to reach fruit not intended

for anyone but a few

who fence out themselves, too. 

What is the gardener to do?

A gate is meant to let us through

to the crop we worked for,

and many of us died for,

a free country we yearn for.

We thought we planted within our reach.

We thought we had enough freedom to teach.

We never thought we would beseech

tearing down everything we had built

to avoid admitting our guilt.

The gate MAGA made is all atilt.

The fence is too high, clearly.

We are just so frustrated and weary.

We may never eat another strawberry.

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LAST BREATH

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What is the period of mourning

when a nation dies before our eyes?

Not in sudden cardiac arrest,

not like a slow cancer.

nor a natural aging

of its body politic.

But, like a chronic illness

which has worsened over time,

sometimes in remission

allowing hope to remain alive.

But, when death’s grip pries

the life from every cell

which protected a nation from demise

and its heartbeats accelerate

at a far too barbaric rate,

what then? How can hope survive

when our national freedom dies?

The violence, the bombs, the rubbled ruin 

comes after the next election, I fear. 

The election may save us from loss

of freedom, but at a cost.

Like Ukraine, we can take a nation back

by electing constitutional, loyal leaders

and set our enemies off to the side.

Like Ukraine, our enemies will regroup

and ferociously and physically attack

what they could not seize by stealth.

They will never let go of power and wealth

which we allowed them to take during this

DOGE-dealing, Heritage Foundation steal.

Courts may save us for a time.

But, be prepared.Everything is on the line.

And the mourning is ever-ceasing

for those who see the fate

of a nation which for too-long

embraced its power and its wealth, 

and allowed itself to hate.

Slavery was our original sin and set the stage

for all the other hate and division

that has led to this time of fear and outrage.

How long is the mourning period for such a loss?

It has been my entire life; yet, my hope has endured.

But, my body senses death at my nation’s door.

And, I fear I simply cannot take it anymore.

What is the end to this period of mourning?

Every cell in the body politic is warning

that this nation, our beloved nation

may be close to its last breath.

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