Happy America Day

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: FOURTH OF JULY

Happy America Day

Today we celebrate the founding

Of a European nation on a faraway land

A land the inhabitants call

Turtle Island

The natives embraced the name Indian

Because it means People of God

People of the Great Spirit

In Dios we trust

The people of the Great Spirit

Did not know what to make of America

The Italian name after the explorer

Amerigo Vespucci

(they hardly knew him)

We might have been called Columbia

For the Indian killer and slave master

We might have been Liefland

After the Viking explorer Erikson

But the Vikings did not colonize

Did not write the history books

We might have been named after

The first slave traders

Or the early Spanish explorers

In search of golden treasure

And fountains of youth

But they did not find what

They were looking for

We are Americans in America

Though Peruvians and Canadians

Are Americans too

We are all Americans

Even those who were here long before

The European invasion

The conquest and genocide

We are all Americans

Even those who came without consent

From lands across the sea

We are all Americans

Even those who have toiled in the fields

And in the homes of affluence

Raising children of the chosen

Without acknowledgement

We are all Americans

Even those who were denied citizenship

And the right to vote

At the birth of the nation

We are all Americans

And we have a right to celebrate

How far we have come

And how far we have yet to go

Contempt

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Contempt

Contempt: worthless and deserving scorn

An out of control prosecutor

Can be found in contempt of court

An out of control president

Should be found in …

Contempt of science

Contempt of public safety

Contempt of justice

Contempt of democracy

Contempt of international order

Contempt of honesty

Contempt of common sense

Contempt of common decency

Contempt of working people

Contempt of the poor

Contempt of education

Contempt of intelligence

Contempt of the norms

Contempt of the presidency

Contempt of immigrants

Contempt of diversity

Contempt of humanity

In contempt of all we hold dear

In the land of the brave

Now the world holds our president

In contempt and Americans pay the price

Isolated and ostracized

Discarded and alone

Banished from the world

Of civilized tribes

The Rising Tide

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

The Rising Tide

Where are they now

Those fools and make believers

Who said it was all a spoof

Invented by deceivers

Standing before a rising tide

They instructed us to sleep

They told us not to worry

It never gets this deep

Now we’re drowning in the waters

The cliffs are at our backs

And where are you the criers

Telling us to blame the blacks

We don’t believe you anymore

You’ve lied to us too long

Believing has cost too much

We’ve soured on your song

So go away and hide yourselves

We won’t follow you again

And if you show your face round here

The days of vengeance will begin

Dark Days Democracy

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Dark Days Democracy

The art of politics has yielded

to the dirty lowdown scourge

of mass disenfranchisement

The dark days of democracy

are knocking down the doors

Voting in the midst of a rapidly

spreading virus is hard enough

without closing down precincts

and denying vote by mail

Do they want the disease to spread?

Do they want us to die?

Have we arrived at a place

where our tolerance for others

is so low we would rather see

our opposition sick and dying

than to let their voices be heard? 

Dark days democracy

when a deadly disease becomes

a political lightning rod

When science and medicine

belong to one political party

When our president double dares

his political opponents

to risk their lives

by standing in endless lines

on election day

When did Republicans

abandon the republic?

Dark days democracy indeed

Guilt and the Sickness

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Guilt and the Sickness

Like a gentle breeze in the silent night

It comes to steal your life

We have been cautious

We have kept our distance

We have covered our faces

Avoided gatherings

Yet questions haunt me

For there are times

I might have slipped

Times I might have allowed

Someone to come too close

Or stay too long

Or share too much air

We are all human after all

And yet I am certain

We have been far more careful

Than nearly everyone we know

It does not seem fair

That we should be haunted

By guilt as well as the sickness

itself

The Bounty

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR

The Bounty

Russia offers a cash bounty

On American soldiers in Afghanistan

Money for bodies like coins for scalps

And the president stands down

The blood of our warriors

On his cold trembling hands

And America stands down

Vladimir to Donald:

Who owns you babe?

Who butters your bread?

Who paves the road ahead?

Bow down before your master!

Bow down and take your pill!

Nobody has to know

But you and me and heaven

Give me Georgia and Ukraine

Get me back in the G7

If it costs a few soldiers so be it

Remember when the union was Soviet

So be a good boy and bow your head

The American century is dead

Now Mother Russia rises again

And populates the earth

With strong Russian men!

Code of Honor

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Code of Honor

A warrior never leaves his fellow behind

In the heat of battle

He remembers the weak and wounded

He risks his own life to save others

It’s his code

His sacred honor

Without which he could not live

His life in peace

We have passed 100 thousand casualties

In a war that has no end in sight

Collateral damage is mounting

And we have only begun the fight

Our commander sounds the alarm

To signal our retreat

He’s tired of fighting a virus

He has market numbers to meet

He will leave behind the wounded

He will not count the dead

He’ll stake his reelection chances

On the Dow Jones instead

What of sacrifice and honor

What of the warrior’s code

Honor is for losers

It is not the horse he rode

The Lord and the Virus

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR:  CORONAVIRUS SERIES

The Lord and the Virus

The Great Plague

The Black Death

The Spanish Influenza

The religious have always claimed

The lord would protect the righteous

They were wrong

They have always been

A virus does not examine

The spiritual status of a body

A virus has no regard

For religious fervor or piety

A virus does not distinguish

Between Christian or atheist

Between Muslim or Jew

A virus does not determine

Who is spiritually true

A virus thrives on human tissue

Any body will do

(Two thirds of a religious gathering

in Eastern Oregon tested positive

for the Coronavirus)

Family Circle

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Family Circle

Doing the right thing

Staying at home

Keeping our distance

Not taking chances

Staying safe the way we should

But I wonder now and then

How everyone is doing

Not in the abstract

Not on the phone

Not on social media

But up close and personal

My folks left some time ago

Never had to face this test

But the rest of us are near

Still living around here

My brothers and sisters

Nephews and nieces

Love them all to pieces

Babies being born

Some folks moving on

Kids growing up

Living lives without us

I miss the family circle

I miss looking them in the eye

Each and every one

Hearing what they have to say

Seeing what they really mean

I miss their tender love and caring

Moments that we shared

I miss the lazy days we spent

Shooting the evening breeze

Singing songs and telling stories

I know those days will come again

At least I hope they will

And we will cherish them all the more

For the gaping hole they fill

(for Ethan on his birthday)

Lynch's Irish Pub (Fifteen Ladies)

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Lynch’s Irish Pub

Fifteen ladies went to celebrate

A night at the pub

A memorable date

A night to remember

As cold as fate

Fifteen ladies all sick today

No masks did they wear

Needless to say

The virus did not care

Now the Irish Pub is gone

They had to close it down

Because ladies should not die

For a night out on the town

The ladies didn’t die you say

They got sick and some recovered

But each went home to someone

And they infected one another

The truth is we’ll never know

How many lives were lost

We know it was not worth it

No matter what the cost

Hold the Line

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GEORGE FLOYD SERIES

Hold the Line

We’ve been pushing so long

Our bones are starting to push back

Decades of resistance

Centuries of struggle

Truth be told

Millennia of pressure

On our worried minds

Hold the line

So tired my eyes close by themselves

My back aches my legs pulsate

My brain screams at the endless plight

Every step reminds me

Of the struggle ahead

And the struggle behind

Hold the line

Work until your fingers bleed

Talk until you fold

March until the sun rises

Watch until you’re blind

Hold the line

Nothing worth achieving

Was ever accomplished with less

Than everything you’ve got

This is our time

Hold the line

No matter how many times

They beat us down

And trample us

No matter how times

They batter us

No matter how many times

They take our money our homes

Our peace of mind

Hold the line

We will prevail

We will take what is rightly ours

We will right forever wrongs

We will stand our ground

We will not fall behind

Hold the line

For all who came before us

And all who will follow

For our children

For posterity

For all that we hold dear

For peace and prosperity

For justice and equality

For the good and the kind

Hold the line

Mount Rushmore

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR:  GEORGE FLOYD SERIES

Rushmore

 

While we’re taking down statues

Of confederate heroes

Consider the abomination carved

Into the sacred mountains

Of North Dakota

 

Think of them what you will

Slaveholders or emancipators

Conservationists or buffalo killers

Racists or liberators

The great white fathers

Do not belong in the Black Hills

Sacred ground to the Lakota nation

 

Crazy Horse belongs in the Black Hills *

Sitting Bull belongs in the Black Hills

Black Elk belongs in the Black Hills

Big Foot belongs in the Black Hills

 

Take down the defenders of slavery

Deglorify the traders of slaves

Break down the great white commanders

In the home of the free and the brave

 

Replace the symbols of white supremacy

With the defenders of equality

Replace the champions of treason

With the proud guardians of reason

 

We are what we deify

We are what our books embrace

When our history teaches lies

Our entire nation is disgraced

 

* (Crazy Horse Monument is just down

the road from Mount Rushmore; its

inscription reads: “My land is where

my people lie buried.”)

To Mask or Not to Mask

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

To Mask or Not to Mask

To mask or not to mask

That is the question

Whether it is nobler to display loyalty

To the man in power

Or enhance survival of the species

To mask yet ask no questions

Demand no answers

To let the virus work its darkness

Or stand in opposition

And by resisting perchance to stop him

Ah there’s the rub

What further damage might

Our species do if allowed

To spread and thrive?

The species or the planet?

Will not destruction of the former

Spare the latter?

I shall despair

Paralyzed in procrastination

Frozen with indecisiveness

I wait and wait again:

To mask or not to mask

That is the question

The Real World

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR:  CORONAVIRUS SERIES

The Real World

We leave behind our virtuality

Just as we all prayed

We must wonder where we stand

In the brutal light of day

We have made a great investment

In the realm beyond our view

Must we question all our musings now

What is false and what is true?

We have formed new attachments

And we must wonder if they will hold

Have we made too many commitments?

Were we restrained or were we bold?

The real world awaits us

It never really went away

We lower expectations

And hope the world will stay

Twisted History: A Legacy of Shame

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR:  GEORGE FLOYD SERIES

Twisted History

400 years since slaves arrived on the American shore

220 years since the birth of the Underground Railroad

200 years since the Missouri Compromise

163 years since Dred Scott

159 years since the inception of the Civil War

157 years since the Emancipation Proclamation

156 years since the burning of Atlanta

155 years since the 13^th Amendment

154 years since Lincoln’s assassination

154 years since the birth of the KKK

153 years since reconstruction

150 years since the dawn of Jim Crow

124 years since Plessy V. Ferguson

99 years since the Tulsa Massacre

83 years since the death of Bessie Smith

81 years since Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit

75 years since the Civil Rights Act

65 years since the lynching of Emmett Till

56 years since Nina Simone’s Mississippi Goddamn

55 years since the killing of Malcolm X

55 years since the summer of Watts

52 years since the assassination of the King

51 years since the Hampton and Clark

29 years since Rodney King

7 years since the nullification of Voting Rights

7 years since Black Lives Matter

6 years since the murder of Michael Brown

6 years since Tamar Rice and Eric Garner

5 years since Jamar Clark

4 years since Philando Castile

3 years since Charlottesville

2 years since Botham Jean

1 year since Danquirs Franklin

4 months since Ahmaud Arberi

3 months since Breonna Taylor

2 months since Sean Reed

1 month since George Floyd

1 day since Rayshard Brooks

After 400 years of twisted history

False promises exploitation

And brutality

Atlanta burns

America wonders why

The Band Plays On

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR:  CORONAVIRUS SERIES

The Band Plays On

The death toll rises

As the band plays on

Fire fills the western sky

And the band plays on

Old folks keep on dying

While the band plays on

Loved ones are crying

As the band plays on

Our hospitals are overrun

Our cities smell of rot

A shadow lurks o’er the sun

Our happiness is not

We live in sorrow day and night

The horror has no end

We hide our eyes from dreadful sights

As death becomes our friend

Blindness is appalling

When it is willful ignorance

When it harms the ones we love

And offends intelligence

The death toll keeps rising

Our faith is almost gone

Our sympathy is fading

While the band plays on

Acceleration

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Acceleration

The virus finds its mark

Zeroes in

Attacks like a pack of wolves

Spreads like a murder of crows

In flight

Accelerates like a diving bird

Of prey

We thought it would go away

Returned to our ordinary lives

Locked our old folks in their place

Stopped tracking the daily toll

Placed our fate in the hands of god

Rolled the dice and played the game

We are where we are because

We wanted to be free

We are where we are because

We refused to be controlled

By some incomprehensible enemy

Because our leader went to sleep

Dismissed all the guards and

Told us not to worry

Because we are Americans

Always in a hurry

The virus doesn’t care

What we say or what we think

The acceleration is happening

As we stand on the brink

Return of COVID-19

RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: CORONAVIRUS SERIES

Return of COVID-19

Like a grade B movie from the fifties

A horror flick no one wanted

And no one flocked to see

Back by unpopular demand

And stubborn insistence

It’s COVID-19

Killer of the elderly

The frail and the infirm

With a penchant for darker skin

It strikes by day strikes by night

Travels by air and evades sight

It claimed 100 thousand lives

And still got no respect

So it returns in form

To claim 100 thousand more

No one can say

We did not have fair warning

It comes like a whisper

To lead us in mourning

We know what to do

But we’ve lost our patience

We’ve lost our will and common sense

So let the old folks go

Let the weak fall down

Let the young and strong

Seek solid ground

Contrary to wishful opinion

It did not disappear in warmer weather

It did not thrive on media attention

It survived without intention

Like a shadow in the dark

It worked its deadly spell

On frail and unsuspecting prey

One by one the weak ones fell

Gone from view it now returns

To ravage us in light of day

And we are left with little to do

But bow our heads and pray