If I'd known, I wouldn't have died

She comes to my dorm room
from a frat party,
face flushed
stinking of beer.

She rubs herself against me,
tells me how much she loves me,
misses me.

I let her calm down a little
before I ask her,

"So, who've you been
making out with this time?"

Plenty of them out there, forced rhymes,
non sequiturs, contradictory lines,
mixed metaphors, just plain nonsense.

But the music catches you up
and, sooner or later, you're snapping
your fingers and singing along,
mouthing those ****** lyrics
as if they were the finest poetry.

Rambo Jr. mugging
for the camera, little rooster
cocking around.

See his backward cap?
See his AK-15?
Isn't he the coolest?
Isn't he a Sport?

Looking for trouble?
No, begging for it.

And finding it.

So that, when the little
Dork trips over his own feet,
he comes up firing.

Isn't that what he came for?

In court now,
in suit and tie,
his chubby white face
reeking of privilege.

On the stand, coached
by his high-priced lawyers,
not quite as dumb
as he looks on video.

Such a nice boy!

The chatty judge,
half-senile, loves him.

And the white jury?
They do to.

So the little *******
gets away with it.

Three Georgia Crackers
went ++++++  hunting
and bagged themselves
a  ++++++. Not a black man,
not a human being, a  ++++++.

His name was, is Armaud Arbery.
The Crackers did not know
his name that day, nor did they care.
They were proud of themselves.
They thought they got away with it.
The jury thought otherwise.

Thank goodness.

The needle, the vein:
conspirators.

The body, the brain:
accomplices.

The sweet poison:
irresistable.

Ten years of sobriety?
Those good intentions?
A child's balloon
snatched by the wind.
Gone.

Sandusky, Cosby, Madoff:
the wives riding the gravy train,
turning a blind eye

Sandusky: hiding upstairs,
ears finger-plugged, humming
to herself--whatever the Big Goof
was up to down in the basement
with those young boys
none of her business

Cosby: Disarming
his accusers with fake charm,
posing as a good friend while studiously
ignoring all those silly allegations,
as if her Dearly Beloved Meal Ticket
really was America's Favorite Dad
and not America's Most Famous
Serial Roofie-em First ******

Madoff: Hiding assets,
mailing her kids a million dollars
worth of jewelry and trying to keep
it a secret, on TV, she's so, so sorry,
never suspected a thing (okay Pinnochio)
moving now into a pricey mansion,
snacking on caviar again

And the victims? Too **** bad