lantern raised
she yields not
to the untamed hand,
the empty heart,
the preening, the predatory,
that find the pure,
the passionate,
and the tempest that swirls about them,
to mark and groom,
their trust wrought for a singular end,
prevarications
to render truth writhing upon the
calumnies of acolytes,
the hardscrabble earth
where the courage and decency
of the many break and recede  
until wretchedly,
shamelessly,
forsaken

Sometimes I just have to admit it.
Things are happening and I don’t get it.
What the hell is going on here?
Is an explanation from anyone near?
It makes a kind of sense, if you squint
But soon it caroms off on another bent.
I mean, it’s all in my native language, true,
But so much of it feels like visiting a zoo.

My life can turn into a monkey house
And without a decent kind of warning
And suddenly I’m dealing with issues
That weren’t there in the morning.
Some batch of politicians on the right
Are busily trying to steal my serenity
And maybe even trying to imprison me
And at least take away my dignity.

They say they are doing all of this
In the name of holy Jesus Christ
But it still works as a ripping off,
And an indecent but legal heist.
I may not be an attorney myself
But I was also not born last Tuesday.
These rotten scalawags in suits
Are trying to take my rights away.

It makes a kind of sense, if you squint
But soon it caroms off on another bent.
I mean, it’s all in my native language, true,
But so much of it feels like visiting a zoo.

It always amazes me that these jerks
Somehow manage to sleep at night
Because it’s plain enough to see
That what they do really isn’t right.
For example, for two hundred years
It was legal here to own negroes.
But that it was an sickening atrocity
Was as plain as their white nose.

But they held cotillions and soirees
And treated slaves like breeding stock
And sold off the black babies which
Seemed to happen around the clock
Because it made sense to these Christians
To ignore everything that Jesus said
And treat these people barbarically
From their birth until they were dead.

Sometimes I just have to admit it.
Things are happening and I don’t get it.
What the hell is going on here?
Is an explanation from anyone near?

There are plenty of modern references
Like treating immigrants as villains
When every white person in the USA
Were immigrants, most of them willing.
But rich people here are so upset
That these people are not the right kind
And that gives the rich white people
An excuse for them to be rude and unkind.

I could go on and on with this complaint
For pages and chapters without end.
I’m still waiting for someone to tell me
“Enough! We conservatives agree and say 'When!'”

"O victory forget your underwear we're free"...
Yet we all keep our genitals intact, immaculate, in closure
Inside flannel suits and ties and shirts and microphones
And all of that ******* we created called modesty and decency
Oh...and kindness
Kindness is no more than a way to keep our will from funcioning
Modesty and decency no more than ways to keep our
                                             love from being free

And if love can't be free, what else can?