John-Ward Leighton

WHAT’S HAPPENING?
(For My American Cousins)

You come home with bad news your spirit in defeat
your job has just been shipped overseas
and you find a padlock on your front door
and your wife and children on the street.

The man you elected to change this
has appointed the thieves to investigate the crime
and see your hard earned tax dollars
pour into bonuses for the thieves all on your dime.

Then a deep water drill platform explodes
and the people whose incompetence caused the disaster
are appointed to cap the well, do the cleanup
and what the hell, control the media as well.

Five weeks in
you are still unemployed and on the street
with only food stamps
so your kids can eat.

The beaches are befouled
in the greatest ecological disaster in history
and all we have for answers about the abuses
are excuses.

The man you elected
has some fine rhetorical flourishes
but that won’t put food in your kid’s stomachs
and the government’s action has no traction.

Two wars being fought
with a poor person draft in a so called professional army
and faced with your own problems
you hardly notice.

The corporations and the pentagon
are running fat and sassy
with one trillion tax dollars and more to go
pouring down the military industrial greedy corporate rat hole.

You have no time for the future
today your kids are homeless and hungry
and the future is the location and time of their next meal
that’s the reality, that’s what’s real.

The man and the politicos you elected
lie quite easily
while stealing your resources in plain sight
and then they say that it’s their right.

You can’t swallow the myths of
the Christian right, unless you truly believe
that there will be pie in the sky
when you die, lucky guy.

Justice, don’t make me laugh,
the magnitude of their crimes is off the graph
but the blows continue beyond your ability to respond
can it get any worse, are they gonna getcha, you betcha.

It’s like getting continually stuck
with lightning
and you are zapped yet again before you can say
what’s happening?

John-Ward Leighton

WHAT’S HAPPENING? (For My American Cousins)

WHAT’S HAPPENING?
(For My American Cousins)