Those who voted “Trump”
are jail-breakers, criminals
in their sad way, too.
Tag Archives: Republican Party
UGLY CHRISTMAS SWEATERS
Ugly Christmas sweater season has begun.
Americans seem to think it is fun
to dress themselves not in the season’s finest,
but in the ugliest sweater they can find
to celebrate together a sacred date
forgetting the solemnity of Advent’s long wait
to share with us a love divine.
Trees go up lit by flames to give us warning
that climate change may soon end
the faithful earth upon which life depends.
A cabinet full of ugly sweaters fills,
worn by those who think they are better
than faithful civil servants whose only goal
is to keep America safe and whole.
Executives dodging background checks
don the ugliest sweaters they can find
hoping to make a buck or two
off the game pitting us against each other,
me and you,
against all hope that we can survive
a very dangerous political ride.
The party which once celebrated
freedom and patriots’ pride
donned ugly sweaters when it realized
white control was on a slip and slide
with the rising hopes of women
and people of color’s growing pride.
The uglier the better the saying goes,
for Christmas sweaters worn by those
who forget the reason for a season,
forget the principles of a constitution,
forget the laws and regulations
which hold together a flawed nation
and allow democracy to thrive.
The time of ugly sweaters has arrived.
POST-ELECTION 2024
My sorrow does not come
from the loss of an election.
Sorrow bubbles up and pulls down
faith and hope and trust in
legal and constitutional protection
for the progressive direction
we moved, pushing hate aside,
within the blue bubble
where I reside,
within a gerrymandered state
full of Christo-fascist pride.
Court protection is now
too often set aside.
Criminal leaders with immunity
can now act with impunity
to destroy an entire nation,
indeed a free world.
Greed acts with such speed
to push grace and care aside.
And truth is destroyed
by incessantly repeated lies.
My sorrow does not come
from watching my nation die.
It comes from watching
fellow citizens kill my beloved nation
Right before my eyes.
And the worst part of it all is,
that it is not a surprise.
I have watched a predator party
stalk us creatures of democracy
my whole life.
The day I most feared
is no longer just a nightmare.
It is the reality of imminent strife.
I cannot simply smile and reach out,
asked to shake hands with voters
with blood on their hands,
when I want to shout “traitors!”
I think of all who died to protect
and defend my country, my best friend,
I cannot stand to watch cruelty up-end
a nation now at-sea, afloat on lies
that all is at is has always been
after an election.
The desperation of a nation
tears at the soul within.
The soul of each and every American,
until America is dead and buried,
so that rich oligarchs can feed
their need for power and control.
Citizens United has long been on a roll
to knock down all opposition,
and watch weak Americans fold
their cards and lose their last hand.
Such sorrow, I fully understand.
NIGHTMARES
I dream of Nazis…
men in blue jeans and camouflage
jackets with pockets
to hold weapons,
wearing red MAGA hats;
and bleached-hair women
in comfortable clothes
and comfortable shoes,
smiling at cameras
while they praise
a nobody who makes them feel
like somebody.
Like tools they line up
on his bleachers to be used
to disparage and demean
the others they call fiends.
These are not dreams.
These are nightmares come alive
and rending the seams of a nation’s fabric
with fascist schemes.
I can no longer sleep
in the silence
of so many who stay quiet.
Too ashamed to shout with that lout.
But willing to vote him in
to the place where our destruction begins.
I dream of Nazis,
the shouters
the doubters
the scoffers
the weak
the divided
the insiders
who refuse to give up
position and power,
while hour after hour
the fascist beast devours
airwaves and pews.
Let there not be too few
to block his way
on election day.
VOTE!
AVOIDANCE
All I want
is to avoid
my own thoughts
lately clothed in fear
so pronounced
they bring me to tears.
It finally must be said
anger fades to grief
when death brazenly nears.
Watching a beloved die,
clutching the hand,
wiping the brow,
for perhaps the last time
applies to nations.
I watch my beloved country
whose solemn vow
has always been protect and defend
all those living within
the boundaries of an idea in place
to open freedom’s gates
to all equally, within its small space.
I hold my nation’s heart and soul
with trembling hands
and shortened breath.
In painful realization
that so many countrymen
in this amazing nation
fear not, nor mourn with me
the loss of our democracy.
Friends and family alike
smirk and snarl in true delight
the unleashed dogs of fear and fright
which rip apart all we have built
without a trace of grief nor guilt.
They break my heart
as they tear our world apart.
DANCE IN THE RAIN
If not too early, perhaps too late
rain falls through parched skies,
in drizzles and drips only;
clouds’ moist linings absorbed
by dried out cells
of the hydrogen and oxygen
we need to survive.
The train’s whistle blows
in drowned out gasps.
Wet skies hold back
the usual click and clack
of dry wheels over steel track.
Iron wheels now slip and slide,
a smoother if more uneven ride.
Wet nights lead to wet mornings
drowning our the train whistle’s warning
of all that is to arrive
during this election drive.
Tom-toms beat quieter drums
to speed up hearts
and slow down minds
as the train approaches
the nations’s destination.
AI interrupts nature’s offer
to set things straight
without a factual bother,
as facts fall beneath
the slippery wheels,
and we are easily thrown off-track
unsure now what is fiction or fact.
We will all soon be mad as hatters.
Too soon, we wonder if anything matters.
After drought, roots unfold soundlessly
and it is hard to hear the truth’s refrain.
Our senses our dulled by falling rain.
Our restless sleep disrupts our days.
We are lulled by quieter chants,
but nothing has changed.
Courage now, lads and lasses.
The polls await the arriving train.
We must vote, in sunshine or rain.
Open sad and tired eyes.
Listen with too-numbed ears.
The sounds may be different,
but not the refrain.
Time to vote the danger away.
Time to learn to dance in the rain.
Vote!
DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
Best to keep parched lips closed in the midst of drought.
When the rain comes, as it surely must, lips open wide,
with head tilted back, in a tumultuous shout.
Filling up with rain, one wet swallow can seem enough.
Memory quickly returns of a mouth full of dry dust,
reminding one a single swallow is not enough.
After thirsting so long words have grown tough
to swallow, feel bitter, feel wounded, feel flushed
where they would be drowned
if only rain would fall down.
Still, the short rain is enough to stir us to our feet,
on the forward march to greener pastures,
cool beneath our bare feet,
taking their fill of all the rains
that have gone before to make this place
one where one may stay to laugh and play.
We will not go back.
Tears of joy rain down now.
We swallow them whole,
filled with power so bold
we believe we control
the weather.
We don’t, we know.
But, we can vote.
And our vote grows in volume
as word drops form streams
and create new rivers of dreams
that flow within oceans so strong
their freedom carries us along
to new and better shores
where right overcomes wrongs.
Words fall like rain, again and again.
Dance in the rain and play
on the way to election day.
POLITICAL PARTIES
Notes do not always ascend
in a crescendo of delight
They also bend low
beyond the heart’s swift beat
until we feel breath stop
fearing heart’s defeat.
Notes ebb and flow
in patterns we do not anticipate.
Yet the music goes on
in beauteous escapade
across unlit rooms,
across shady glens,
across sunlit fields
and parking lots awash
in un-natural lights aglow
above harsh surfaces of worry
where we park to listen.
Music soothes as often as it pushes
heart rates into overdrive.
We rise on dancing feet
or subside to slumberous ease.
One orchestra makes sense
of the notes unfolding
up and down,
racing and slowing
until the music transcends
the past and brings us up fast
to the climax at the end.
Two orchestras cannot play together
unless they play the same notes
at the same pace to the same place
in time and space.
Each must follow the same rules
and read the same music sheet.
Without such agreement
there is a cacophony of sound.
No matter how well one orchestra
plays by the rules, its uplifting
music becomes mere sound,
its rhythm unable to be discerned
by the racket from the second
orchestra who has turned
from reading the music sheet
and playing by the rules.
We cannot stand the dissonance
and turn the music off.
We mistakenly believe
both orchestras at fault.
It is time to call a halt
to the orchestra of whining instruments
which refuse to abide by music’s rules
and continue to play us false.
I yearn for the sweet sounds of truth.
November cannot come too soon.
ASSASSINATION OF A NATION’S SOUL
Assassination of a Nation’s Soul
What violence and threat to our democracy
has done to me
cannot be undone, it seems.
I watch the source of so much pain
fall to ground, his right ear maimed.
I wonder at the loss of feeling at such sight.
I try to feel something, anything, even fright.
Instead numbness overtakes my soul.
This does not seem the same to me
as the grief I felt for the John or Bobby Kennedy,
for Martin Luther King, Jr. or Medgar Evers;
Cheney, Schwermer and Goodman;
For Malcom X and Viola Luizzo.
Where did my compassion go?
I wish I could say I know.
Suffering is all the same.
Every human being feels its shame.
Even that I cannot feel
as layer by layer the Constitution unravels,
and freedom’s bell no longer peals.
How far my hope has traveled
beyond court decisions and hateful words
meant to appeal to nameless hordes
by those who speak only for themselves,
cheered by those who fill their empty chords.
Surrounded by narcissistic churls
whose images and taunts unfurl
across media’s many avenues,
such violence seemed inevitable.
And, all he cared about was finding his shoes
as others tried to protect his life,
he struggled against their efforts
exposing them to more danger
so he could rise within their safe embrace
and raise a fist in everyone’s face.
Still, I feel nothing.
Neither sorrow nor joy.
Neither faith nor fear.
Neither love or hate.
Neither hope nor mistrust.
Look at what this man and his supporters
have done to us!
Filed under POETRY
THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
Only one thing is certain.
In your heart, you know it to be true.
The only person who matters is you.
That is the core of democracy,
a republic which is not a theocracy,
nor a monarchy, nor autocracy.
No man or woman will come to save your nation.
Now, pay attention
to school boards and zoning boards,
and definitely boards of election
where you will find your greatest protection.
Watch the mayors, governors and secretaries of state.
Do they make decisions with love or hate?
Vote out those who help keep his curtain closed
before it is too late.
The man behind the curtain is a wizard and a clown
who loves the limelight and will never fight
to keep the nation safe, nor guarantee your rights.
The man behind the curtain entertains himself
by entertaining fear in everyone else.
Those who serve him bow down in disgrace
and forfeit the security of any safe space
to exercise their freedom of ideas.
They can no longer listen to you.
They must do what he says they must do.
He looks for a way to escape.
Leave him to stew.
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
Only one thing is certain.
That is you.
VOTE!
Filed under POETRY
annarino writes 