When things are too hard
to take, take to creation
within and without.
Tag Archives: trump
ART THERAPY& Haiku
D.E.I. and I
I have stayed away from words,
breathless, in my grief,
for too long.
Diversity is my faith.
Equity is my hope.
Inclusion is my love.
Each breath I take is a promise
that things will be better someday.
And, they have been for a time,
in places expanding across space,
across multiple divides.
In a school, then university.
In a church, then a community.
Across a state, on national forums
Each breath inhaled the hate,
expanded and expelled love in its place.
Breaths took down barriers, created programs,
enacted policies, changed syllabi,
created courses and news ways of seeing,
new avenues of progress, new ways of being.
The backlash always came,
in drips and drabs, all the same.
But this! This! It is a fearsome game.
It is not D.E.I. which they decry.
They want to see us hold our breath
and die.
They SNAP food from the mouths of babes.
They ask the aged and disabled to work their own miracles,
heal themselves without medic-aid,
waste away, and die.
They place tariffs on those who stood at our side.
Making us all pay more for less to save their pride.
They fill their pockets with our labor,
changing coins to crypto for their greedy favor.
They extort heroes who fight to protect freedom world-wide
so that dictators and killers can be by their side.
They miss the days when the few controlled the many.
They refuse to compete, or share even one penny;
pennies earned from our labor, not theirs.
Lately, it seems we have not got a prayer.
We seldom did. But, do not despair.
What we did have was the freedom to try.
Now, our hard-won freedom to speak and act is denied.
We are being denied the right to even try.
We still have one another, and our God-given rights.
We will never allow those to be shoved aside.
And at the end of this life we shall hold hands and sigh
We tried.
We tried.
We tried!
SELF-CUTTING
It appears my country is bleeding out
from wounds cut both shallow and deep.
Blood flows from old wounds reopened.
Those hurt the worst, do not doubt.
We see patterns of hate where cuts scar.
MAGA rubs the body politic until it burns.
It wears long sleeves to clothe and hide
the wounds of Project 2025.
Our collective guilt has finally won out.
Cutters inhabit the White House
screaming fake rage and fake news
that makes great TV
but leaves the world crying to see
the death of a once-great democracy.
Stop the bleeding we beg and plead.
Staunch the flow, lower those hands
cutting so eagerly
to destroy the place we once felt safe,
if not perfectly, at least happily, free.
Cutters cannot stop themselves.
It is up to you and me.
THE BOOT
Bodies tell stories.
The boot is on the right foot.
It lifts up the right side.
It tilts the body left.
The left leg shortened,
for a short while;
long enough for the right
heel to heal the heil.
The right heel steals balance.
The right heal steals my right
to take walks, plant seeds,
to talk with ease, laugh aloud.
The right heel pains me,
isolates me,
leaves me motionless.
Soon, the boot will be off.
Therapy will begin to complete
the healing needed to stop
the pain in the heel, and heal the heil.
The extra weight will be lifted.
Both feet will balance the gait
of a body ready to move forward,
beyond the lies, beyond the hate.
Time to heal, if patience allows.
I ask so little it seems;
and yet, too much for now.
Now, when words destroy bonds
formed from shared adversity,
in fear of diversity and loss of power.
I stumble through the day, booted
by the weight of the jack boot
on a leg that has born too much weight
of too much fear, too heavy a hate.
And still, despite the added weight
and uneven gait, I march on,
in my own, stilted way,
on this President’s,
not King’s,
Day.
SELF SOOTHE
This is my most recent project. I hope it soothes your soul and cheers your heart during these stressful days.
WITHIN
I thought I could not write because of my pain.
Not, so.
I hesitate to write because of my disdain.
You know.
I think you have may felt it before.
It rises not from my within.
It rises from your within. It is your most-feared sin.
It sleeps in the place your secrets are kept
of all the times you felt inept.
While I simply raced along your side,
trying to match all the runners with pride.
But, you did not want me there.
That is your eternal prayer.
You thought I should stay in my place.
You feared I could actually win the race.
You deep-down know how weak that feels.
You deep-down know how foul the appeal
to those who would embrace
every runner in the race.
So, you create fake news and tell stories
that cause the runners and watchers to worry
that the race is fixed, corrupt and costly.
You can only lose if there is nothing left to gain.
You prefer full destruction than your personal pain.
You care not the cost.
You cannot handle a loss.
It is you I disdain.
You, I hear explain in rambling detail the goodness,
rightness, advancement of hate.
You who shuts doors and padlocks the gates.
You, I watch burn books and erase history.
You, who imagines a world draped in mystery
where no scientific fact
can remain intact.
My words cannot be allowed to create
more fear, more sense of loss, more hate.
My words could darken the stars.
My words could start wars.
That I cannot allow and must abate.
I cannot add one ounce to your tons of hate.
If you think these words apply to one man,
you sadly misunderstand.
They apply to all of us, to me and to you.
We created the world we try to eschew.
In our deep spaces are we mere bagatelle?
Are we a nation without a story to tell?
We need not seek nor accept our ruination.
We have a Constitution, amended to perfect our nation.
We race not to win a trophy nor prize.
The race does not rely on crowd size.
We run to show how races can be won
when runners align and voters cheer on
every runner who flies by.
By my definition
the greatest competition lies within.
Racism is our Original Sin.
I’d Rather
I’d rather have King George III back.
He answered to Parliament.
We answered to it, too. It is true.
To those promised to hold his rule in check.
We now answer to Elon Musk,
A privateer, if not a pirate
selling his goods to the highest bidders.
Our enemies cheer him on
With promises of increased wealth.
And our new King Showman
Pretends he rules, taking his share.
Unchecked, unleashed, unaware
He has made war against us all.
THE FIGHT WITHIN
The Cold War taught school kids to “duck-and-cover”
to save their lives, not from bullets fired by fellow Americans;
But from Russian bombs put in place
to put America in its place
in every available space
where bombs could reach our shores.
President Kennedy intervened to stop the ships
carrying missiles to fill silos built in Cuba.
School kids stopped to pray that day
before being sent home to “be with their families.”
I recall that day when annihilation of my nation
became too real to hide away.
Khruschev shouted “We will bury you” as he beat his shoe
where he sat at a desk in the UN.
He foretold our future there and then.
He said we will “destroy you from within.”
That is when the great pirates began to grow rich
in their race shore to shore running
arms, and drugs, and sex slaves galore;
depositing money passed hand-to-hand
into banks off-shore until it washed up and over
the World Bank, its monolith waves too big to ignore.
The dish on American tables ran away with the spoon
feeding the greed of a growing American oligarchy.
It has taken my lifetime to measure
the true loss of America’s treasure
amassed in stealth by pirates dressed as lobbyists,
and PACS funded by dark money
who claim the false goal to live free in our fragile democracy,
our greatest wealth.
The pirates stole into control of our country
with entertainment instead of news.
Encouraging citizens to sleep and not be woke to the tragedy
of pirates placed within a government grown too thin
by tax cuts for the pirates like Trump, Vance, Bannon, Musk, Ramaswamy,
Hegseth, Gabbard, Alito and so many others.
Leaders now promise to deregulate all guards against their pirate theft.
And a sleeping nation nods “yes,” ignoring the pleas of true patriots, left bereft.
The pirates have opened the gates and our Ship of State is un-moored.
They smile and smirk with strong-men and must not be ignored.
We cannot simply give up and give in
watching our country destroyed from within,
while Putin and America’s pirates count coins and grin.
annarino writes 
A LETTER TO US ALL
Dear Us:
Did you ever hear of the Golden Rule? “Treat others as you would be treated.” When asked which of the ten commandments Moses shared with the Israelites was the most important, Jesus advised questioners to “Love others as I have loved you.” In the 60s, even non-believers of any religion, or of even the existent of God, followed the precept “Lead with your heart.” “Flower children” believed in love, for everyone, at all times. And those were turbulent times. We watched freedom riders maimed and killed, their busses set on fire, their murdered bodies hidden and buried in shallow graves. We watched the perpetrators of violence go free; the Citizen Councils ( marketing change for KKK) often included law enforcement and local judges. This is the America currently referred to when Trump supporters urge us all to “Make America Great Again.” They no longer wear white robes nor hide their faces. They wear red ties, dark suits and sometimes red hats.They pretend to be news anchors on FOX News and elsewhere. They pretend to be president like Elon Musk. The delivery system of hate may have changed; the racism and sexism have not. We are experiencing a backlash to the progress made over the past 50 years. It took 50 years for it to grow this strong.
I was a resident student advisor (RA) at Lincoln Tower on the OSU campus in Columbus, Ohio in the late sixties and early 70s. I was also a student activist. I had to become one because I believed in the Golden Rule. I watched Black students, Jewish students and women students derided and demeaned. I was privy to racist commentary because white students assumed they could say them to my white face with my full agreement. White men also felt safe making sexist comments to me despite the fact I was a woman. As an Italian-American I was sometimes mistaken for Jewish and heard my share of anti-semitic remarks. Much of the time such hate-talk was passed off as a joke. Whenever I heard the joke I stopped the speaker and explained nothing they said was funny, nor factual. I demanded such language never be used while in my presence. Those who just joined in to feel safe in the crowd became serious and apologized. The bullies did not apologize. But they shut up. “Stand up to shut them up” became part of every day life on campus. That is activism at its core.
I had a few empty suites on my floor due to an on-going criminal investigation. A mentally ill student was on trial for arson, having set fire in a suite the year before. Once the case was resolved, those suites were re-opened and spaces filled, as were other vacancies on my floor. Who moved in to those spaces? Black women looking for a safe space. Some had repeatedly been locked out of their rooms by white roommates. Several had threatening notes nailed to their door; threats to rape or kill them because they were Black. Most were ostracized and demeaned daily by white roommates. Their complaint to Student Affairs fell on deaf ears. When the spaces opened on my floor, they found refuge there.
Our dorm was typical for OSU where Black students made up a tiny percentage of the student population. My floor was unique. I held floor meetings to discuss expectations that we would all follow the Golden Rule. When I saw or heard of a racial incident I immediately intervened. Soon, I was doing racial mediation on a regular basis. Black women entered the elevator and experienced white women moving close to the emergency call button, with hand hovering, ready to cry for help from women just like themselves returning exhausted from a day of classes ? Time for mediation! Call everyone together and talk it through. Day after day. Incident after incident. It was exhausting for the Black women, and the Black men who visited them, to face daily racial challenges and outright discrimination.
Another RA and two students worked with me to develop a racial mediation program in our dorm. Whenever the Student Judicial Council was handed a case involving a white student and a Black student in dispute, it was handed off to us to mediate the conflict. Our efforts were not always welcomed, but we persisted. Incidents of violence, write-ups to judiciary, and racial conflict decreased. Today, this program would be outlawed by the President who gleefully extorts OSU by threatening loss of education grants and federal funds for programs and research. OSU has caved to the bullies. OSU is not standing up to shut up the racism. It would cost money. And money is god in America, and on college campuses.
OSU is caving to racists and bullies again. And, not just OSU. Columbia University, indeed nearly all colleges and universities, if not all, are caving to racist bullies under the guise of following the law, accepting the lawless and illegal actions of the current administration. Following the law would require universities to protect the free speech rights of faculty and students, to abide by employment contracts and civil service laws to protect both administrative employees and faculty. Universities with law schools had readily-available experts to stand up, speak out and take action. I was an Associate Director of Law at Ohio University. There is a national organization of such attorneys. Why are they so silent? Why have university presidents and provosts not joined arms to defend their campuses against illegal searches and seizures of students? Why did Columbia University not come to the aid of Mahmoud Khalil and his family? If they did so in any way, it was neither apparent nor sufficient.
The Poster Boy President leading the racist mob of greedy Americans spoke at the DOJ recently. His racist and personal attacks on lawyers, prosecutors and judges, was accepted and even cheered. Racism and greed cross all boundaries and sexual preferences, exist within every profession, religion and community group. It is a constant and persistent threat to the principles of democracy. Those whose racism had been laid low, who crawled under rocks to hide their sins, have crawled back out, empowered by the greed for wealth and power, threatened by those they spurn who have finally found success on a more equal path, and undermined by their own sense of failure despite the promise of an American Dream. Instead of blaming the greedy power-brokers of industry, banking and finance, politics and education they blame their fellow victims. Their racism blinds them to truth, and they willingly embrace false-hoods and disinformation. They would not recognize a fact if it stared them in the face. They would prefer to attack the fact and the experts offering the truth of the fact.
As a lawyer, as an educator, as a writer, I am heart-broken over the loss of my country, my Constitution and its guarantees of personal freedom for all persons who are in this country…no matter where they came from, or how they got here. That is the promise of America. That is the American Dream. Shopping for cheap goods because your existence only matters if those power-brokers can make a buck off you cannot fill the place freedom once filled within the American heart and psyche. Woke? Woke is what is required to survive the on-slaught against a free people who simply want to find a good-paying job, buy a house, feed and educate their family. The power-brokers want us to stay asleep. Like children, we are angels in our sleep, causing them no discomfort, and quietly staying out of their way as they take over our economy, our government institutions, our military, our banking system, our educational systems and local/public schools…even our post office!
Wake up, my fellow lawyers, my fellow professors, my fellow school teachers, my fellow social workers, my fellow counselors, my fellow retail workers, my fellow waitresses and caterers, my fellow babysitters, my fellow students, my fellow Catholics and people of faith, my fellow Americans. Wake up and stay woke! We have work to do, if we can stay awake to do it loudly and persistently. This is no time to lie down and feign sleep. God knows, none of us sleep well theses days.
Leave a comment
Filed under COMMENTARY, FAMILY STORIES, POLITICS
Tagged as African-Americans, American economy, backlash, Coumbis University, couselling, DEI, disinformation, DOJ, education, elon musk, Equal rights, history, immigrants, judges, law, love, mediation, NACUA, Ohio University, politics, post office, progress, propaganda, prosecutors, racial mediation, racism, refugees, Republican Party, schools, social work, The Ohio State University, trump, univesitiies, Us Constitution, woke, women