RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS
Land of Plenty
Hunger in a land of plenty
How can this be so?
The more they feed us propaganda
The less the people know
They tell us we are prosperous
We’ve more than we can use
But once we’ve paid our daily bills
We’ve nothing left to lose
Hungry in a land of plenty
We blame our president
You gave us something for our pain
But who will pay the rent?
We’re working after hours now
We’ve got those hunger blues
When our kids are going hungry
What else can we do?
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS
Dehumanization
Dehumanization begins with
The delineation of classes
Be it royalty or wealth
The division of the masses
Into higher and lower beings
Enables cruelty and neglect
To those of lesser means
The undeserving of respect
Born to serve their betters
Those of higher pedigree
Those of wealth, the jetsetters
Those who brandish their degrees
From institutions of privilege
Harvard, Yale and Trinity
They’re simply better than the ones
Who sweat for their next meal
The ones who live by their hands
The ones who often beg and steal
Won’t they ever understand
By the turning of the wheel
They’re simply cruder, lesser than
The ones who carry the great seal
The royal bloodline of the grand
Within the circles of the few
Who speak in whispers soft but sure
There is nothing we can do
To ease their suffering
We are the chosen, wise and pure
While they are something more obscure
Dare I say (something less than human)
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS
Brave New World
The brave new world came and went
Before our fascination spent
We rallied to the cry: resist!
They took their shot and missed
The people here are not so lame
Our wilder spirits cannot be tamed
With medicines or other pills
That sap and shape the force of wills
We are as we have always been
Individualistic women and men
Who worship at the sacred tree
Fight long and hard for liberty
We play our separate roles
We’ll never lose our separate souls
Nor sacrifice our sanity
To your dystopian vanity
We know we have our flaws
There are too many laws
That tell us what to think and do
That try to sell us something new
Something bigger brighter wiser
No more greed no more misers
No more worries no more cares
We’ll all have our equal shares
No more loneliness or sorrow
A promise for a new tomorrow
We will fight it to the end
On that you can depend
(re: Aldous Huxley)
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS
Resistance to Change
There is a natural aversion to anything
and everything different than what is
and what has been for a thousand years
or so it seems to me
In every field of endeavor from the science
of microscopic etymology to the art of
esoteric architecture there is a stubborn
resistance to change
So it is in art and poetry, philosophy and
psychology, religion and mythology,
physics and ecology, quantum mechanics
and sociology
When presented with new and challenging
ideas that break the mold of our thoughts
we resist with all the strength we can gather
for as long as our dams will hold
Little wonder that when the dams give way
the waves of destruction engulf towns and
cities, nations and civilizations, entire
disciplines and cherished schools of thought
vanished in the fog of time
Ever wonder what happened to the alchemists?
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL AFFAIRS
England and Europe
“Someday we shall have to choose
between England and Europe.”
-- James Joyce, The Exiles
Brexit marked the end of a unified Europe
The English in their wisdom
Severed the bond that held the promise
of a bright and prosperous future
It seems the English have always seen
themselves above the continent
Not so for Ireland, Scotland, Wales
England casts her lot with America
The mighty land across the sea
The land that tore itself from Britain’s
royal bondage
The land that to this day speaks its
variations of Shakespeare’s tongue
The Irish form their own bonds across
the channel and the sea
The Scottish and the Welsh have
their own independent notions
Dependence on the British is at an end
They saw it coming long ago
The disintegration of the monarchy
The fraying of the isles
We see it coming still
In a world of great uncertainty
We see it with good will
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: UKRAINE
Another Year of War
On the other side of the world
The war continues unabated
Putin’s horrors are unfurled
As if it had been fated
We would change it if we could
We would bring it to an end
We would lock away the madman
And all his brutal friends
What more can we do but let
Our leaders know we care?
Send our aide and best wishes
Make it easier to bear
Make the oligarchs pay the cost
For Putin’s war of cruel attrition
Let him know his cause is lost
Cut off his ammunition
In our part of the world
The wars are only metaphors
The battle for democracy
A trail of horrid storms
We know life could be harder
We know it could be worse
Our storms are free of missiles
We still think of ourselves first
But we swear we’ll not forget
The many hardships you endure
This world is ever smaller
Of that we can be sure
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL WARMING
The Angry Planet
Planets don’t get angry do they?
Yet they behave as if they do
We would do well to heed the warnings
We have so much to lose
Planet earth is angry
Best believe that it is true
She is raging like a banshee
Time to pay our overdues
We’ve abuse her far too long
Little wonder she’s upset
If we don’t amend our ways
Soon enough we will regret
All the poison that we spewed
Into her soil water air
She will take her due in blood
And we will learn to care
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: AMERICAN HISTORY
Times of Confusion
Back in 1965
We were on the edge of something new
We didn’t know what it was
We didn’t know what we’d do
But the old world was rapidly fading
Something had to take its place
We reinvented living in the world
We reconstructed the living space
Based on giving what you had
And taking what you needed
They were times of great upheaval
The revolution had been seeded
We were riding in the Magic Bus
They tried to send us off to war
When we said no they spit on us
And kicked us out the door
They were times of great confusion
Times of wonder and of shame
We rallied to the cause of peace
We found someone to blame
Those times live on in each of us
In a thousand different ways
They shaped the road we traveled
Made us who we are today
We are a nation twice divided
Once by race, once by culture
When we look at the American way
Some see hawks, some see vultures
We are many things at once
We are war and we are peace
We are rich and we are poor
We are hunger at a feast
We are everything to everyone
And nothing to a few
When times are rough in Kansas
They’re hard in San Francisco too
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS
The Multiverse
In one life you’re a beauty queen
In another you’re dark and mean
The multiverse is infinite
There are no limits to the dream
We fly we swim into the depths
We make oceans out of streams
In one world you’re a genius
In another world you’re second best
The multiverse is vast and wild
It takes you on a thousand quests
You find a mask you want to wear
You pass the stiffest test
Welcome to the multiverse
You travel east, you travel west
You journey to the end of time
You settle in a robin’s nest
And there you find your truth
You kill a man named Booth
The multiverse is quite the place
It’s message is its mystery
A simple twist of time and space
Can even alter history
If you don’t like who you are
Change your voice, change your car
Welcome to the multiverse
Come aboard, we will go far
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: UKRAINE
re: The Russian People
We are told the people love you
(they do not know and never did)
We are told that they believe you
(they don’t but they won’t tell)
We are told they think as you do
(we are not that cynical)
We are told they have your back
(they are ready to abandon you)
The truth about the Russian people
Is more complex than we are told
When a dictator has the power
To imprison you for words
To lock you up for speaking them
To hold you without trial
To hold your family in contempt
To punish every gesture of dissent
They will never speak the truth
Not to you or anyone
The people who have taken to the streets
Who have gathered in city squares
Who have spoken their minds
In public or private settings
Are courageous beyond words
They are the ones that will rise
They are the ones who will stand
When Putin finally falls
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL JUSTICE
West Bank Genocide
And so it begins
Empower extremists from the far right
Strip the judiciary of their lawful authority
Wait til the world is distracted
And launch an offensive in the West Bank
A policy of genocide under cover of constraint
Take their lands, take their homes,
Take their livelihoods, take their lives
Where is the Israeli press?
Where is the law of nations?
Where are the people in the streets?
If Russian aggression cannot stand
How can Israel be allowed the same?
If Putin is a pariah and a war criminal
A scourge on the human race
What then is Netanyahu?
If brutality and aggression against the
People of Ukraine is an outrage
How is it not an outrage when the
Victims are Palestinian?
Stop the outrage
End the occupation
Stop the brutality
End the genocide
In the West Bank, in Ukraine
And everywhere
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: UKRAINE
Letter to Putin II
You have lost this war
You have lost on the battlefield
You have lost in the forum of world affairs
You have lost economically
You have lost strategically
You have lost historically
You have lost philosophically
But what you do not understand
Is that you will lose even if you win
Never again will you be welcomed
In the community of nations
Never again will your friendship be valued
Or your allegiance desired
You have joined the pariahs of the world
You have taken your place in history
Among the despised and hated
You will live out your reign in isolation
Like Lady MacBeth no amount of
Cleansing can erase the stain
You have secured an indelible place
In the eternal book of infamy
RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: UKRAINE
Letter to Putin
You can’t turn back the clock
Time doesn’t work that way
You attacked a sovereign nation
A price must now be paid
Now Finland will join NATO
Sweden will soon join too
You wanted a Russian empire
They opposite will come true
No one trusts the Russians now
Not even you best friends
The days of your ascension
Have come to a shattering end
You are a war criminal now
You bring disgrace to your nation
The world you sought to build
Faces imminent disintegration
It’s not too late to reverse course
Recapture a sense of humanity
Put an end to this inhuman war
And its inherent insanity
