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Owen Carter Jan 2019
Blue skies and apple pies
Football games and guns to aim
40 hours of work and fireworks
Heteronormativity and conformity
White tranquility in the midst of police brutality
White terrorism claiming nationalism
What is the American Dream?
Shutdowns and cages and riches for ages
Fascism raises from hateful rampages
Families taken away from their own
These are a few of Trump's favorite things.
What is the American dream?
A flag always at half-mast
In preparation for the next mass shooting
Killing the poor with a minimum wage
That can't even afford rent
Mocking the people we stole this land from.
America the land of the free
Construct of the patriarchy
Thousands of dollars in medical bills
Treating our oceans like landfills.
Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light
A country so broken the end is in sight.
Capitalistic ideals that possess the rich
Destroying the poor as we're thrown in a ditch
Together we must rise above
And show Trump's cult what we're made of.
Classy J Oct 2014
Friend zones, shutdowns, being ignored, mind games, why you do this to me. I don't know what to say one day we're friends next thing I know we becoming something more but I figured wrong and now it's done. Mind games, girl stop playing me, I thought this and then I thought that and just when I started getting over you you come back to me. Mind games, girl stop playing with me, Hitting different chords, I'm just so confused. What should I do? Mind games is all I ever get from people like you, and I hate it.
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
written as im stuck in jam headin back to jersey
Andreas Simic Jun 2022
The poem below is a satirical piece

Written by a poet with too much time on his hands

Coviditis is something created purely as an entertainment piece
Caution is advised to those that do not have a sense of humor

Coviditis is a condition brought on during a pandemic due to prolonged use of mask wearing, social distancing, constant hand washing or sanitizing, testing, self or other, as well as self-isolating, shutdowns, travel restrictions, vaccine shortages, vaccine line ups, vaccine hesitancy and antivaccers.

For those with children locked out from attending school and suddenly becoming teachers at large there maybe additional conditions of the ailment

Symptoms that you may have Coviditis include but are not limited to:

Feeling pent up and wanting to visit family and friends

High stress levels, we recommend home blood pressure kits for self-testing

The urge to put a strangle hold on children or small animals

Temper tantrums like when you were a two year old

Wanting to work from home  to become a hermit and take up hoarding as a hobby

Binge watching reruns of “I Love Lucy”

For those on the edge this could lead to episodes of “Divorce Court”

Exceeding speed limits including road rage and road racing in parking lots

The need to station yourself near hospitals with your protest poster at the ready

Clock watching while waiting anxiously for the pandemic to be over

Treatments
Generally speaking a return to normal is the  best cure for Coviditis
When this is not available we suggest getting normal amounts of rest

Reduce alcohol and leisure drug use (unless prescribed by a health care professional)

Counting to 100 when the urge comes to place choke holds on others

Reduce speeds especially in school zones, truckers should avoid borders or capitals

Take up yoga, Tai Chi or complete regular exercise to offset stuffing feelings with food

Constant hugging of spouses, children, parents, through fist pumps is recommended

Hugging complete strangers in desperation is a no, no

If conditions become worse we recommend zooming
your family physician, Psychologist, Psychiatrist or
Podiatrist, as you may need a good pair of shoes when you want to run away

Also have a travel agent on speed dial, booking two years in advance for you next trip  may make you feel better and lead to something called “hope”

In extreme situations visit the emergency department at the hospital

Please note do not feed the pigeons or the protestors on your way in

Andreas Simic©
You failed to understand my feelings thru and thru
My sweetheart from the very beginning  I love you
On petals of love your beauty comes like drop of dew
You are new in love pursuit so let me take it to pursue

My beloved life is just full of so many ups and downs
Lovers at times are beggars and at another wear crowns
lovers at times like clowns at another heroes in towns
They are the ones who pave there way from shutdowns

My beloved please take me in arms I am totally broken
Rivals laugh at me and take all this as a pun and a fun
Only you are my beloved in this burning desert with Sun
There is none but only you are my real love my passion

Col Muhammad Khalid Khan
Copyright 2016 Golden Glow
TaciturnPhantom Apr 2014
The world
Is out of control,
Spinning from my grasp.
Routine is broken;
Vision filled with
An intense red.
The dread begins.

Sounds sharp and loud;
Light stabbing knives;
Confusion,
Chaos,
Disorder.
Panic rising;
Anger bubbling;
Fear brewing;
Hatred invading.

Erupting screams,
Primal and animal,
Ripping through my vocal chords.
Sinking teeth into flesh,
Feeling the pain
Shoot through my arm.
My fists smash against my body;
Nails clawing into skin;
Head cracking onto the floor.
Tears blur my vision,
Pouring down my burning cheeks,
Dripping to the floor
To form tiny puddles.

Calm down! Get a grip!
Shut up, shut up!
You broke my routine,
And took your *******
Anger out on me!
Made my life hell.
Nothing works
And I hate you;
Leave me alone!

Losing control
To the emotions
That forever dominate;
And the shutdowns
That render me mute.
The world is in chaos and disorder!
Through the jumbled thoughts,
And ravaging emotions:
Anger,
Hatred,
Fear,
And panic.
I can hear a small voice,
Somewhere in the darkness:
“It’s just another meltdown,
Once you are calm
Everything will be fine.”
Running from people,
Locking myself away:
An endless cycle
Of fear and dread.
Of another one of them:
A ******* meltdown!
John F McCullagh Jan 2019
Sam Adams beer masters see there’s trouble brewing:
This governmental shutdown is nothing of their doing.
Still, their beer is piling up in barrels on the floor.
For without Federal approval beer cannot be sold, by law.
They crafted a delicious brew for bottles and for cans,
But, due to the political climate change, they must make other plans.
They’re stuck with vats of golden brew, the nectar of the gods
But this shutdowns ending no time soon, per the bookies who quote odds
To prevent their beers from going stale while the politicians clash
They’re paying the workers by the ounce in lieu of paying cash.
Beer is piling up in the warehouses of Samuel Adam's Boston beer company. Apparently the Federal government beer inspectors are on hiatus.

How do I get that job?
Kevin May 2017
I sit alone, forcing myself in solitude
Fearing my anger and demolition of an attitude
Struggling with suicide and homicide thoughts alike
Living this nightmare, never knowing when I may strike

I pray for life, I pray for death
Mental shutdowns leaving one big mess
A struggle, A nightmare, no relief in sight
Closing the shades to the moon, it s to bright

The crazy thoughts come and go
Suicide watchman loses his way on patrol
Writing, striking, knocking on deaths door
Instead of me it s the few that I love and adore

Clenching teeth until they break
I m still paying for those fckd up mistakes
Still horrified at self actions and emotional pain
Knowing my loved ones ignore the signs of me being insane

But than again maybe I hide it all to well
A rotting empty self hiding in a happy little shell
Sometimes my true colors bleed through and show
Spreading my pain and emptiness for all to know

Sometimes it pushes some even farther away
And really truly, to me that s ok
I never needed the company of them or you
I will puzzle the pieces of my mental illness through and through

Once this nightmare is over and done
Another will arrive with the setting of the sun
Mine offset fooey zook equilibrium
translated into at least one raw bit
(hmm...maybe the naughty one) being askew,
which nearly (worse case scenario) critically
could burn up every hair strand fiber optic wired conduit

sans, and destroy the primary, secondary, tertiary...
connection of this (motherf**) circuit
board, which (sorry tubby explicit),
whew close call offset (viz skin of
"FAKE" teeth), in NIC of time avoided major deficit

thankfully technical glitch
bit dust courtesy re: micro
processor faux wall thwarted,
toppling scaffolding upholding democracy forfeit
sure would totally wreck global functionality luckily

ace craftsman ma papa with keen insight
anticipated built-in catastrophic fail/
safe under soldering gun,
preemptively incorporated chess
grandmaster measured gambit,

hence avoiding future government
shutdowns since implicit
within migrant manufactured mesh
of webbed components houses white lie
sense to circumvent, via automatic
nanobyte size trigger

comprising a binary coded buffered kilobyte,
yours truly able to attune
consciousness to any slight
fluctuation, perturbation, variation, et cetera
imperceptible to nobody but me,

a "smart" sensor, that doubles as infrared light,
whereby coded instructions encrypted airtight
bequeathed to this artificial intelligence
as digitally patented birthright
also linkedin virtual reality appurtenances

portray futuristic bombsight
of World War III a minuscule,
yet not improbable chance event, some bright
eyed and bushy tailed hacker infringes copyright

gleefully launching atomic missiles,
which thermonuclear midnight
leaving Earth a lifeless burnt offering,
where scant bands escape by spaceflight,
whence this garden variety
will no longer be able to write!
Dennis Willis Sep 2019
All of these conversations in my head over and over the things I should have said the things I'm going to say in conversations. That Never happen because no one will ever sit still for the long explanation of how right I am

I should write a TV series or a movie with all these conversations all these satisfying shutdowns. Instead get comfortable with frayed threads floating in my life never resolved sometimes the people just die

So it's not about keeping all the threads neat tying up all the loose ends as satisfying as i think that would be. It's about being alive in The weave of Time and love and open to the nearest smile.

Knowing everything is fraying and growing around us. Both are good. You have a certain amount of time. You have you. You can't get more time or a different you. So love what you have of both. If you want to have a great life, do so passionately.

Find the place where it isn't awkward to be you. Learn how to be comfortably you in any setting.

I'm thinking to my fingertips, thinking to my toenails. I am hungry to know. I'm in no hurry to go.
Edward Mar 2020
I want to say thank you all , for being self-less.
I want to thank all of the doctors, and nurses.
For being the True heroes in saving lives here.
Putting your self out there with those dying.
I want to thank the stores employees and truck drivers
I want to thank those that work at restaurants as well.
I want to thank everyone that works and their services.
Help all that do not work because of the shutdowns.
For their jobs are very important in serving others now.
I want to thank the police officers, the soldiers, and EMTs and drivers.
You all work selflessly, in helping others to protect us now.
I want to thank also those I have not mention as well too.
Marlon Mar 2020
Who’d have ever thought...
About the world becoming so motionless
Feeble and partly cold
As it gasp through the **** of Covid-19

was the great soothsayer asleep
cruising deep in the comfort of his dream
When the pandemic ushered despairs
Were the prophetesses on honeymoon
When this ungodly invention
hit the shores of Wuhan
Impending strongly and unfurling like a wild fire across the globe?

Ever seen before
shaped like a crown with postrusions look
Zoonotic as it is
Crossing all species to dine face to face with **** sapiens in antagonistic rattle
Halting life in a very spine chilling tick
Whiles graves pulverize
Rapidly at every inattentive motions

Tick tick tick
Lock downs everywhere
Shutdowns everywhere,
Border gates and posts locked
Instantly human movements confiscated
Speedily numbers of valetudinarians revolt up and up and up against medical scientists
Who are trying painfully but in vain for vaccines
It’s a revolt against time,
trepadiation, fear and ocean of waving grieves
The world is at cessation
Motionless
Feeble and partly cold
And gasping through the gashes
As it swam between the hard hitting waves of inhibitory and safeguarding life over Covid-19
preservationman Apr 2020
Flash Flash
Don’t aim for your cash
Events that took place while you were sleep
It was while you were sleeping deep
Only your soul to keep
The budget that is out of control
The virus shutdowns that still take hold
The clouds that increase
No sun so no feast
So when will this virus decrease?
No one truly has an answer
Not even the star of TV Bewitched named Samantha
It’s wait after until when
Again, no one knows when this virus will end
Yet other states have their own quest
But the east coast could careless
The East is not convinced
So the shutdown will continue
Right now our lives are withdrew
So that’s all the news
I know you are not enthused
You might even be confused
But as President Trump often states, “What do you have to lose?’

— The End —