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in our
besieged republic

snipers are
popping up
everywhere

taking ***
shots

ending lives
with a well placed
head shot

active shooters
star in
world premier
events

jokers
rise like
dark knights
casting large
looming shadows
on real 3D cinemax
multiplexed screens

sprinkling overpriced
buckets of popcorn
with generous
dollops of blood

others
head back to
school
still ******
about missing
recess and
excessive
sentences
to detention
halls where
bullies tortured
scrawny inmates
with wedgies
and painful
***** twisters

they’ve
come back
to even the score

leaving
bullet hole
pockmarks on
Sharpie smudged  
smart boards
declaring endless
summer vacations
for classrooms
of children
who don’t
give wedgies
and only dream
of soft *****

these
urban guerillas
are now working
to liberate airports
from the tyranny
of TSA agents
fulfilling
PATRIOT ACT
duties for
10 bucks
an hour

and
last night
the latest
active shooter
showed up at
the Garden
State Plaza,
-my hometown
mall of america-
mumbling about his
Grand Theft Auto
score, strung out
and crashing
from an unfilled
pharma addiction
script

he grew
up as a
Highwayman
in Teaneck

a former
classmate
working
at Nordstroms
said he was
a really good kid

he was,
one of the good ones,
he could have shot
some people
but the only
person he
shot in the head
was himself

legions of
police officers
surrounding the mall
stood down
grateful for overtime
milling about
in the flashing
red strobes
inhaling the heady
blue fumes
rising to commend
Bergen County
Blue Laws and
next Sunday’s
time and a half
active shooter
training day

Jimi Hendrix:
Machine Gun

Oakland
11/5/13
jbm
ogdiddynash Jun 2020
woman asks a why-oh-why
while-I’m-driving-interrogatory,

seeing that tears are rolling down
old poet’s face as we transverse
these United States,

on I-80, Heading to San Francisco,
over the George Washington Bridge,
commencing in Teaneck, New Jersey,
2,906 miles, not including getting lost.

Are you sad for any reason particular?
Are we lost already?

weeping for my country, for with every mile,
see amity and wisdom disappearing,
out the open window,
both by wind taken,
both forsaken,

our route is clear,
but I see what
I most fear, we are not lost,
but my country,
our poor country
is,
everywhere good people,
desperately seeking mercy now!
Mercy Now
Mary Gauthier
My father could use a little mercy now
The fruits of his labor fall and rot slowly on the ground
His work is almost over it won't be long, he won't be around
I love my father, he could use some mercy now
My brother could use a little mercy now
He's a stranger to freedom, he's shackled to his fear and his doubt
The pain that he lives in it's almost more than living will allow
I love my bother, he could use some mercy now
My church and my country could use a little mercy now
As they sink into a poisoned pit it's going to take forever to climb out
They carry the weight of the faithful who follow them down
I love my church and country, they could use some mercy now
Every living thing could use a little mercy now
Only the hand of grace can end the race towards another mushroom cloud
People in power, they'll do anything to keep their crown
I love life and life itself could use some mercy now
Yeah, we all could use a little mercy now
I know we don't deserve it but we need it anyhow
We hang in the balance dangle 'tween hell and hallowed ground
And every single one of us could use some mercy now
Every single one of us could use some mercy now
Every single one of us could use some mercy now
Grandma was a tchatchke from
Teaneck whose shtick was to
hak a chanik her husband Harry,

a boychik from Brooklyn who hated it
when he heard bubbe meises from his
wife’s mishpocheh that were gornisht

compared to the tsuris he had to deal with
in the fercockt business world where
schlemiels and shlimazels were always

trying to schnorr him for a bissel of this
or a bissel of that with such chutzpah that if
you had to put it in a poem you would plotz

— The End —