Unplug the TV.
Turn off the internet.
Going dark is the only thing that we can do.

Whether we know it or not, we are only feeding into these egregores.
We say we want to be informed.
We consider it being educated, cultured, aware.
But for what?

What good does it do to learn about the trials and tribulations around us?
So we can voice our opinion?
So we can say, "I told you so"?
So we can flex a little mental muscle,
playing games of connect the dots,
trying to predict the next big event?

We can watch it all fall apart, sure.
Pop some popcorn. Refresh the page.
Check the latest pinned threads.
But in the end what will it have mattered?
Aren't we all just trying to get the best seats in the house,
So we can watch the world burn around us?

Movements are not going to change anything,
No amount of rioting, protesting, demonstrations, reforms,
Viral videos, shares and likes, subscribers, followers,
You can be the loudest voice in the room but to no avail.

So they'll come for your guns.
What then?

You fight off one, maybe two, rounds of invaders.
They keep coming.
They keep moving in.
Surrounding you on all sides.
Then ****! Your homestead just got WACO'd.

The war drums beat and the trumpets blare.
Bombs bursting in air.
Flags tattered and charred.
The stores are empty.
Your shelves are full.
For how long though?

One year? Five years? Ten year plans?
Then what?

When the soil is irradiated.
The waters contaminated.
The fish and birds and animals long since dead.
So hungry that you'll eat another human being?
Your mother? Your wife? Your son? Your daughter?
Dinner for ravenous wolves?

This really is the apocalypse.
It's not a lightning crash,
but a slow burn.
While the rest of the world denies,
and the angels in heaven cry,
the demons inside of us lie,
Not this time.
Not today.

We made it past this failed prediction date,
Y2K, 2012, Me Tel U Now,
What next?
September 23rd?
Are we really ready if it is?
So you think you can survive the fall,
well be proud and pat yourself on the back.
When the rest of the world is gone,
and only you and your hatred remain,
who will validate your ego then?

When the radioactive fallout pours from the sky,
covering everything in it's murky haze,
toxic winds and acid rain,
a scorched, ransacked and ravaged earth,
this is your inheritance?

Martial law
New World Order
FEMA camps
Economic collapse
Global pandemic
Staged alien invasion
Second comings
False messiahs
Peace and safety,
Woe and destruction

When it comes will you look back and remember these last dying days?
Will you regret following every trending story,
Every false flag media distraction,
Trying to predict and prove and make your point?
Will you feel justified then?
The doom you waited for so eagerly having finally arrived?
Your affairs all in order,
Scott free by the skin of your teeth,
the last of a dying race,
victorious and supreme?

Go outside.
Breathe in the air while you still can.
Hug your wife or husband or children.
Call your brother or sister and tell them you love them.
Put aside petty differences.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for ONLY THEY shall be called the sons and daughters of God.
This truth seeking superiority profits us nothing.
Vanity,
Vexation of spirit,
Chasing after the wind.

Soon days like these will be just a memory,
Something you'll daydream about,
Only to snap back to a cold and desolate room,
A can of kidney beans,
Three bullets left,
Not enough oil to keep your lamp burning through the night,
Danger around every corner,
Everyone you loved and cared for dead,
The pit in your stomach,
the lump in your throat,
the hope for survival all but snuffed out,
waiting for the rapture,
waiting to wake up from that bad dream

Won't you wish you had done more?
Loved harder?
Forgave sooner?
Given more generously?
It's not too late to start,
Those memories you make today,
Will be the fuel you need to keep going then,
It'll be the only thing keeping you alive,
when all else has already failed.

Its 8:30 in the AM
The Corn Moon
is being routed by a
Manassas cloud bank

NPR be barking
Irma this, Irma that
my tremblin Rav4
stuck in the rush
is idling behind
a pair of gray hairs
spewing
leaded premium
out the back
of a big old black Buick
sportin Florida tags

inching north up I95
I’m relieved to be
a thousand miles
ahead of the
monstrous *****
denuding Barbuda
deflowering the
****** Islands
and threatening to topple
the last vestiges of
Castro’s Dynasty
by disrupting upscale
bourgeois markets
for cafe Cubanos,
cool Cohibas and
bold Bolivars

she’s a CAT 5
counterclockwise
spinning catastrophe
churning through
the Florida straits
bending steel framed
Golden Arches
shaking the tiki shacks
gobbling lives
defiling tropical dreams

the best
meteorological minds
on the Weather Channel
plug the Euro model
to plot a choreography
of Irma’s cyclonic sashay

they predict she’ll
strut her stuff
up a runway  
that perfectly
dissects the  
Sunshine State
ransacking
the topography
venting carnage
like battalions of
badly behaved frat boys,
schools of guys gone wild
sophomores, wreaking havoc
during a Daytona Beach
spring break
droolin over *******
popping woodies at
wet tee shirt contests
urinating on doorstoops
puking into Igloo Coolers
and breaking their necks
from ill advised
second floor leaps
into the shallow end
of Motel 6 pools

but I’m rolling north
into the secure
arms of a benign
Mid Atlantic Summer
like other refugees,
my trunk is
filled with baggage
of fear and worry
wondering
if there’re be anything
left to return to
once Irma
has spent herself
with one last
furious ****
against the
Chattanooga Bluffs of
Lookout Mountain

Morning Edition
Is yodeling a common
seasonal refrain
the gubmint is
just about outta cash
congress needs to
increase the debt limit

My oh my,
has the worm turned
during the Obama years
the GOP put us through a
Teabag inspired nightmare
gubmint shutdowns
and sequestration
shaved 15 points
off every war profiteers vig
it gave a well earned
long overdue
take the rest of the week off
unpaid vacation
to non essential
gubmint workers
while a cadre of
wheelchair bound
Greatest Generation
military vets get
locked out of the
WWII Memorial on the
National Mall

this time around
its different
we have an Orange Hair
in the office and there's
some hyper sensitivity
to raise the debt ceiling
given that Harvey
has yet to fully
drain from the
Houston bayous

the colossal cleanup
from that thrice in a
Millennial lifetime storm
has garnered bipartisan support
to  clean up the wreckage
left behind by a
badly behaved
one star BnB lodger
who took a week
long leak into the
delicate bayous of
Southeast Texas

yet we are infused
with optimism that our
Caucasian president
and his GOP grovelers
now mustered
to the Oval Office
will slow tango
with the flummoxed
no answer Dems
to get the job done

pigs do fly in DC
Ryan and McConnell
double date with
Pelosi and Schumer
get to heavy pettin
from front row seats
beholding droll  
Celebrity Apprentice
reruns

The Donald, Nancy and Chuck
slip the room for a little
menage au trois side action
transforming Mitch and Paul
into vacillating voyeurs
who start jerking their dongs
while POTUS, and his
new found friends
get busy workin
the art of a deal

rush hour peaks
static traffic grows
in concert with
a swelling  
frenetic angst
driving drivers
to madness
terrified
they won't
get paid if
the debt ceiling
don't rise
they honk horns
rev engines
thumb iPhones
and sing out
primal screams

unmindful drivers
piloting Little Hondas
bump cheap Beamers
start a game of
bumper cars
dartin in and out
of temporary gaps
uncovered by the
spastic fits and starts
of temporary
decongested
ebbs and flows

A $12 EZ Pass
gambit is offered
the fast lane
on ramp
has few takers
just another
pick your pocket
gubmint scheme
two express lanes
lie vacant
while three lanes of
non premium roadway
boast bumper to bumper
inertness
wasted fuel
declining productivity
skyrockets
the  wisdom of
the invisible hand doesn't
seem to be working

DOJ bureaucrats
In Camrys and Focuses
dial the office
to let somebody
know they’ll
be tardy

gubmint contractors in
silver Mercedes begin
jubilantly honking horns
NPR has just announced that
Pelosi and Schumer
joined the Orange team
the rise in the debt ceiling
will nullify their 15%
sequestration pay cut

NPR reports the
National Cathedral will
deconsecrate two hallowed
stained glass windows of
rebel generals R E Lee
and Stonewall Jackson
it's a terrible shame that
the Episcopal Church
will turn its back on the
rich Dixie WASPS
who commissioned these
installations to commemorate
the church's complicity
in sanctifying the
institution of slavery,
WWJD?

as I ponder
this Anglican
conundrum another
object arrests my
streaming consciousness
upsetting an attention span
shorter and less deep
than the patch of oil  
disappearing under the front
of the RAV as I thunder by
at 5 MPH

to the left I eye a
funny looking building
standing at attention
next to a Bob Evans

I’m convinced
Its gotta be CIA
a 15 story
gubmint minaret
a listening post
wired to intercept
mobile digital
confabulations
from crawling traffic
inching along
beneath its feet

this thinking node
pulsing with
intelligence
reeking with
counterintelligence
the tautological
contradiction
guarantees the
stasis of our
confused
national consciousness

strategically positioned to
tune into the
intractable Zeitgeist
culling meta code
planting data points
In Big Data
data farms
running algos
to discern bits
of intelligence
endeavoring to reveal
future shock trends
knows nothing
reveals less

the buildings cover
is its acute
conspicuousness
gray steel frame
silver tinted glass
multiple wireless antennas
black rimmed windows
boldly proclaim
any data entering
this cheerless edifice
must abandon all hope
of ever being framed
in a non duplicitous
non self serving sentence

the gray obelisk a
national security citidel
refracts the
fear and loathing
the sprawling
global anxiety
our civilization's
discontent
playing out
in the captive
soft parade
ambling along
the freeway jam
imobilized
at its stoop

Moning Edition jingle
follows urgent report of
FEMA scamblin assets
arbitraging Harvey and Irma
triaging two
tropical storm tragedies
and a third girl
just named Maria
pushed off the Canaries
and is on its way to a
Puerto Rico
homecoming

while
gubmint  bureaucrats
anxiously push on
to their soulless offices
the rush hour jam
has peaked
my WAZE
is having a
nervous breakdown

next lane over
a guy in a gold PT Cruiser
is banging on his steering wheel
don’t think this unessential worker
will win September's
civil servant of the month award

Ex Military
K Street defectors
slamming big civie
Hummers
getting six mpg
lobby for a larger
apportionment
of mercenary dollars
for Blackwater's
global war on terror

Prius Hybrids
silently roll on
politely driven by
EPA Hangers On
hoping to save
a bit of the planet
from an Agency Director
intent on the agency's
deconstruction
the third 500 year hurricane
of the season
is of no consequence

obsolete
GMC Jimmy’s
are manned by
Steve Mnunchin
wannabes
the frugal
treasury dept
ledger keepers
pour good money after bad
to keep the national debt
and there clanking
jalopies working

driving Malibus
DOL stalwarts
stickin with the Union
give biz to GMC

nice lookin chicks
young coed interns
with big daddy doners
fix their faces and
come to work
whenever they want

my *** is killing me
I squirm in my seat
to relieve my aching sacroiliac
and begin to wonder if my name
will appear on some
computer printout today?
can’t afford an IRS audit
maybe my house will
be claimed by some
eminent domaine landgrab?
Perhaps NSA
may come calling,
why did I sign that
Save The Whales
Facebook Petition?

The EZ Pass lane
is movin real easy
mocking the gridlock
that goes all the way
to Baltimore
a bifurcated Amerika
is an exhaust spewing
standing condemnation
to small “R”
republicanism  

glint from windshields
is blinding
my **** is hurtin and
gettin back to Jersey
gunna take a while
GPS recalcs arrival time

an intrepid Lyft driver
feints and dodges
into the traffic gaps
drivin the shoulder
urging his way to the
Ronnie Reagan International
I'm sure
gettin heat from
a backseat fare
that shoulda pinged
an hour earlier

Irma creeps
toward the Florida Keys
faster then the
glacial jam
befuddling congress

I think I just spotted
Teabag Patriot
Grover Norquist
manning a rampart
bestriding a highway overpass
he’s got a clipboard in hand
checking the boxes
counting cars
taking names
who’s late?
who’s unessential?

man
whatta jam we're in

Music Selection:
Jeff Beck: Freeway Jam

Orlando
9/21/17
jbm

She came in like a thief in the night, discreetly after reaching a three she put up a horrific fight.

In the wee small hours of the morning she began hugging up closely to her other half, spotted through a plyboard knot hole she took the beach then she laugh.

She forcefully wrapped herself around her man, not caring who was in her path with no remorse because she can.
Running the inhabitants off his land, not even a life jacket couldn't save their pension plan.

Slapping him around everything God has established, was gradually disappearing and just simply vanished. 

A family stranded on roof top, no one too rescue them not even a cop.
Eighteen hours on the roof of their home a couple with their son and daughter, surviving off a can of Pepsi and Top Ramen while friends of their lost there mother and father. 

The waters are calm and silent in this narration, a catastrophe witness by many is there any question. 

She leaves behind a reminder, a devastation with no arrest  made because they won't be able find her.

Who will support them? Who will back their decisions? Afraid, the people at FEMA, a political set back while over a thousand die in the hands of Katrina.