Black lives matter. Me too.
Not my president. Give peace a chance.
Luck runs out. I like immigrants.
Power must be challenged by power.

Equal and opposite reactions.
God is the answer. Love is the answer.
Walk on the sunny side of the street. Meat feet.
Learn to drive. Wait for the train in the rain.

A girl gets sick of a rose. Mock orange.
Mediocre presidents, unnecessary wars.
Triumph and humiliation. Meditation.
Sometimes I’m tired of being me. Therefore.

Subaru. Suduko. Haiku. Hulu.
Stop on red, go on green. Orderly neighborhood.
Too tired to be angry. Too tired to do homework.
Tolstoy is the Tolstoy of the Zulus.

College campus. Saguaro, cactus.
Million dollar movie. Aliens in the bleachers.
Full length feature. TED talk, lecture.
Breathe in experience. Bring sentience into an expressible state.

Events pile up with or without an identity willing to organize them.
Events in their mere chronology make no sense.
Inability to transcend own interests. Inability to find one’s way.
Vacations and accomplishments accumulate late in life and early on.

Late in life I struggle against my insignificance.
The straight way lost. Concentrate on this: Thy will be done.
The straight way misplaced. Get over it. Someone tell a joke.
Love. Vote. Join a committee or a party.

MLK made the jump from race to class, dreamed of a brotherly nation.
Is this feeling nostalgia for the past or occipital neuralgia?
Knee surgery, plywood factory. Lost lover, lost city.
Old friends who are dead to me but still here.

Somewhere there are flowers among railroad ties.
True love between ****** partners. Dusty villages and vast cities.
Popper v. Niebuhr, impeachment inquiry.
Hassid and Muslim dress codes. French fashions.

Watch for war, **** and shower. Do the limbo.
Pay bills. The very thought of the rosy dawn makes Jack ill.
Big comfy couch, a nocturnal upon St. Lucy’s Day.
A long day’s journey into night. Truckin’.

Death comes for the archbishop. Private Ryan and Big Red One.
Absence of knowledge and intelligent beings who make things happen.
Life’s brevity and the time taken to carve the canyon.
Decibel level and ambient noise. Captain Carpenter and Mr. Flood.

Nothing but ocean, self-aware organisms and the longing they provoke.
Unit, corps, God, country. Zip code. The clocks and the docks gone and       no smoke.
Achilles and Hector. Wills and losses.
Continued existence and most of history.

A holy condition. A warrior’s position.
Walk with a limp. Don’t complain about pain.
Truth may be ascertained by considering your uncertainty.
If everyone votes and every vote’s counted, time is the mercy of eternity.

Amidst the politicians,
decisions on propositions
positioned to requisition
this very nation's fate,
only leads to derelictions,
and weaknesses in convictions,
unending belligerences,
and finally, blind hate.
Banditos jumping fences,
to make it to better living...
this freedom is an incentive,
not a gift, so why wait?
People dying overseas,
Pollution and disease,
Brings the planet to its knees
And steak to your dinner plate
They think it's great!
they use the greed to cultivate the hate.
They squeeze upon the clamps
designed to encapsulate our fates
and in their avarice they find
the keys of heaven dissipate
between their fingers like the time
it took to make a bank so great,
but still they take, and they don't mind,
when you die sooner, now, or late,
cause they charge you for the diapers,
dinners, tax all that you've made,
Then they charge you for the service,
while they're waited on by maids,
but, yeah, okay, make your choice,
Between the men who make you slaves
And cast your vote, between two evils
Of slightly different shades.

I.

“Victor, would you like to meet at room zoom?
Emily called, she knew he wasn't keen to boom

A little bit to the blue pole, a little bit under the red flag; 

Everyone has ideas, who is ready to share?
Zoom in.  Zoom out.
How many truly care?

II.

Victor, once more we've entered the room zoom

A place we've been to before
the questions remain, simple and plain
Is that a dangling mate?
Is this the real victor?

A choice is a choice, one for everyone
Sum up the numbers, leaving us numb

Is the rhetoric speech, exhausted, at last?
Would the world -all people- wait for exciting news?

It’s all about the covid war, though not the flu
Zoom in. Zoom out. In the end,

III.

The world turned and the pathway ended
Do you still believe we all lose?
Two empty trees shaded like a pair of poles

Emily whispered to herself: “the warmth of the sun in the right.
Divided by a flimsy fence, all that's left is in the cold.
Victor, would you like to meet at room zoom?”

US troops zoomed by leaving a stench of smoke.
The birds however continued their solo chanting.


Note: A legal challenges in the wake of the 3 November vote to contest ballot counts.

You may not know my name,
But I was the witness on the ballot.

Count them, count them all...
Send a message to fat cats
Some things aren't for sale.

So much depends upon...
how willing
you are to stand
in line
glistening in the rain
waiting to sign
your name
longing to right
the wrongs
and fix the broken
axles of the red
wheelbarrow
and maybe paint
it blue
as a Blue Jay
flying free
in a blue sky
above white chickens
like shadows
of clouds
over the barnyard.

tension politics
tomorrow we need to vote
we need liberty

Brian Hill - 2020 # 279