John-Ward Leighton

CHIN MUSIC: 03:09 hours

the half way house of a dream
where the words flow now like a stream
the context quickly forgotten
and remembering is verboten

the occupy dreams of pie in the sky
as if in payment for liberty
we all have to live in a tent city, us city slickers,
and chant the rhetoric of bumper stickers

fleeting words of insight
to pass you on the street
as humanity dies starving at your feet
and see the ghosts of the children you will never meet

surrounded by the edifices
of the one percent whose riches seem heaven sent
and whose power is the strength to have us all cower
in the shadows of their office tower

the waking words
are far from the dream
and some have gone to hide
quite naked before my pride

the conversations with long unseen friends
and rap poetry to drum and base
with ghetto voices ever in your face
disturbing the comfort of the one percent’s time and place

loved ones from far away in tears
as the hero’s body returns
who can heal our loss and hear our lament
for the dead from the wars of the one percent

theirs is the world of ten to five thirty
no need to sweat and get down and dirty
those scruffy denizens wet and cold in the tents
offend their eyes and tell the world of their guilt

sweep them away with the help of your hired thugs
cry the one percent’s candidate for mayor
don’t want the tourists to see the cracks in facade of paradise
a world of homeless truth is never nice

but the din and the street will only win
when the whole system is brought down
the rotting stink of privilege and class
is just too sickening to let it pass

occupy occupy occupy
those in power see and hear
there is no place to hide
the chanted words of song and rhetoric

hiding in the words
of
our chin music.