A Delicate Balance

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL POLITICS

 

A Delicate Balance (Hard Choices)

 

It’s a question of relative evil

The world’s need for Saudi oil

The invasion of Ukraine

The crimes on Yemeni soil

 

The Saudis are brutal oppressors

The Russians are equally bad

We yearn for simpler times

The relationships we once had

 

But the world has never been simple

We have had to make hard choices

When we silence one bad player

We enhance another’s voices

 

In the place we find ourselves today

We require the Saudis on board

To ease the global tensions

To end the Ukrainian war

 

The time must someday come

When we deal with the devil no more

I confess it seems unreachable

Like a ship on a distant shore

 

Yosemite Burning

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CLIMATE CHANGE

 

Yosemite Burning

 

We are the caretakers of the land

And we have failed our charge

Yosemite Valley is on fire

Wawona is burning

The towering Sequoias

Trees that have survived millennia

The passing of wars

The ravages of logging

The age of industrialization

Now face the threat of warming

 

There is something quite obscene

About destroying ancient beings

Far older and infinitely more majestic

Than modern civilization

It is a failure of our culture

And a failure of our nation

That our most prized possessions

Our land our parks our forests

Our natural wonders

Now face an existential threat

And we can do little

To prevent it

 

Covid Rides Again

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

 

Covid Rides Again

 

The fifth subvariant of the seventh wave

Comes crashing upon our shore

Works its way across the land

Comes a knocking at our door

 

Will we never rid ourselves

Of this deadly viral scourge?

Or will we let it grow and spread

To enact a natural purge?

 

We know we cannot live this way

Forever and a night

This is not a human enemy

That we can curse and fight

 

So it will run its natural course

Stealing more and many lives

As we pretend it is not so

The virus grows and thrives

 

The Faces of America

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: AMERICAN POLITICS

 

The Faces of America

 

Barack Obama said

There weren’t two Americas

There was only one

Barack Obama was partly right

And partly wrong

There aren’t two Americas

But there isn’t only one

There are more like twenty-two

Under the American sun

 

One America loves to read

Another watches sports on TV

One America plants a seed

Another has no need

One America reveres the flag

Another uses recyclable bags

One America loves barbecue

Another thrives on potato stew

One America loves its guns

Another wishes that was done

One America has no fear

Another cries a river of tears

One awakens to an ocean view

For another a simple park will do

One resides below the border

Another pleads for law and order

 

America has so many faces

So many cultures and so many races

Like the land we have all variations

But together we form a nation

United in our conviction

That together we are strong

We will rise above all wrong

Divided we are weak

That ship will spring a leak

 

Obama was partly right

Obama was partly wrong

He had a dream within his sight

But we are not that far along

Open Letter to the GRU

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL POLITICS

 

Open Letter to the GRU

 

Putin holds the strings of power

But you are the strings

You can sever his connections

He is the bird but you are the wings

He owns the day but you own the hour

He has the drum but you are the beat

He has potatoes but you have the heat

To warm the pot of stew

He is nothing without you

The force of the GRU

 

He is the brain but you are the heart

You are the wheels that carry the cart

He is the madman behind the curtain

With him in charge nothing is certain

It is time to end his reign

For all as well as Ukraine

This man has gone insane

He threatens to destroy the world

For his psyche has come unfurled

There is nothing left to do

It all comes down to you

The force of the GRU