It’ll be different next time,
next time there will be no
hierarchy of actors
Tempted to take the $
and run or spin the motto
for marketing purposes –
And those peepholes poked
through the blindfold of Justice
by thirsty solons
who are, more often than not,
your brown-nosed classmates
who love to be bossy
who love to snap the bosses whip!
The kiss of Liberty is the people’s
aerosol; the person’s vaccine is the promise
each citizen-scientist of the American experiment
Makes to each other laborer
in the soil of truth, toiling for
the harvest of honesty.
The school’d poet is no poet –
no poet worth her NaCl
obeys a dean or a bully
Like Fame who swears
your soul remains pure
through thirty wash cycles.
Take the money, now,
and run to the Youtube
studio for your cameo.
The TV’d rockstar is a poser
– only Dylan quit the show,
the rest kowtow’d, bent low
To accept from Ed Sullivan
the market’s noose, like a medal
hung from Brandname’s neck.
Who knows the crush and the crumble
and the crunch of life under the feet
of the callous society, a culture bereft
Of barbershop quartets, community
colleges overwhelmed by amateur
poets yearning to ignite high school kids
With the fire of language and the
ferocity of the whole ghost nation
that now gasps for air.
Dave Read