A Pope for the Masses

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: POPE FRANCIS

 

A Pope for the Masses

 

The leader of an ancient church

A conscience to humankind

In humble heart we held him first

A unity of heart and mind

 

He opened up the pearly gates

When once those gates were chained

He criticized both church and state

Though his kindness never waned

 

His words spoke to all of us

The wicked, poor and feeble

He understood desire and lust

He drove a stake through evil

 

He spoke to all the masses

The hopeless and oppressed

The rich and lower classes

Every one of us was blessed

 

We’ll never see his like again

Of that we can be certain

To every soul he was a friend

He carried a heavy burden

 

(On the death of Pope Francis,

may he rest in peace.)

The Martyrdom of Darya Kozyreva

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: PUTIN'S RUSSIA

 

Darya

 

Darya Kozyreva is nineteen

She loves poetry and yearns for freedom

Darya Kozyreva will spend three years

in the gulag for poetic dissidence

 

She pasted a verse from a Ukrainian poet *

on his statue in St Petersburg Square:

 

O bury me, then rise ye up

And break your heavy chains

And water with the tyrant’s blood

The freedom you have gained

 

It did not use the tyrant’s name

It did not need to

It didn’t mention the war in Ukraine

It was self-evident

 

Darya Kozyreva was a known dissident

Now she is a known hero

She valued truth over her own freedom

She felt the suffering of her Ukrainian friends

She refused to remain silent

 

She is one of hundreds in Russian jails

For speaking out against their president

For speaking out against his dirty war

 

In America we do not imprison dissidents

We detain and deport foreign students

For writing anti-Israeli editorials

 

In America we find more creative ways

to punish those who criticize the president

and his oppressive policies

 

We are not Russia but we are on the path

that Putin laid out before us

where dissent is outlawed

and public protest is treason

where even listening to an opposing view

is a punishable offense

 

* Taras Shevchenko

Escalation

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL POLITICS

 

Escalation

 

The war in Yemen escalates

The war in Ukraine accelerates

The war in Gaza venerates

A once and would-be king

 

He was the master deal maker

He promised war would end

He was a giver not a taker

His deals would make amends

 

The bombs in Yemen fall

The missiles in Ukraine

They’re building up the walls

Mass destruction is in vain

 

All his promises are broken

His words a waste of breath

All his efforts are a token

To a world of endless death

 

The war in Ukraine escalates

In Yemen war accelerates

A land that Israel decimates

A long-forgotten king

 

The Shadow of Istanbul

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: WORLD DEMOCRACY

 

The Shadow of Istanbul

 

What happens in Turkey does not stay in Turkey

 

Its shadow of darkness spreads

like a chilling wave over the land

and across the sea injecting poison

into the body politick even in the

land of the free

 

What happens in Istanbul does not stay in Istanbul

 

It foreshadows the nightmares to come

as the gathering force of protest and

resistance builds in towns and cities

across the nation

 

How long will the president endure the

indignity of dissent?

 

He has imposed the Alien Enemies Act*

to deport residents to foreign prisons

 

How long before he declares martial law

to nullify the right to assemble in protest?

 

He has ordered mass deportation without

regard to due process of law

 

How long before he orders the mass

detention of law-abiding protestors?

 

They are holding show trials in Istanbul

to see how far they can go

 

Are there enough prisons to imprison dissent?

 

There are if we count El Salvador

 

What happens in Turkey does not stay in Turkey

 

By tomorrow it will be here

 

* Alien Enemies Act of 1798

Open Letter to the Russian People

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: RUSSIA

 

Open Letter

 

People of Russia I humbly speak

I appeal to your humanity

If peace is what you seek

Do not yield to your vanity

Don’t believe that we are weak

 

You are not your dark leader

We are not the same as ours

In a forest of hard cedar

We have both built our towers

We have listened to deceivers

 

But we do not desire war

Despite all you might have heard

When you knock upon our door

We will hear your honest word

And we will travel to your shore

 

As for the matter of Ukraine

We believe in basic rights

Let us make it very plain

We do not believe in might

We will not embrace the pain

 

We believe in sharing views

We believe in compromise

Let us walk in common shoes

Let us form more common ties

If we fail both sides will lose

 

For the world and for ourselves

We must end this bitter hate

Put our differences on the shelf

Let us forge a better fate

Let’s regard each other well