Your crowning spires
Your towering glories
Of glass
Brick
And steel
You have stolen
The deer that roamed these hills
Before you leveled them to make
Roads of concrete
You've sired the ghettos
And molded men into vagrants
Their ladies
Are now roaming the streets
Looking for recyclable trash
Or pinning notes on doors offering
To clean the offices
To fluff the carpet
For your expensive shoes
To walk on!
Walking to your desk
Phoning to make another
Deal to develop
More human waste
Your deal with those who will give
The nod much like the
Wild mustard nods...
Nodding to me this morning...
It agreed that it was perfectly fine for all
The tiny Finches to nest
In the near-by willows.
It nodded that it heard the
Trees crash when they
Fell
It nodded that it did hear
The crack of the
Eggs the birds had laid
And it
Nodded that
That 'yes, it's sad' there's no
Picketing
When the abortion of their babies takes
Place - no controversy, as to
Whether it was legal
Moral, or right
To kill
Unborn Robins!
The token playgrounds;
The basketball poles
The nets that hang
Still hang while you
Hung
The homeless
At the same time!
The nets swing - rotted from rain
And sun
The wind blows the truth
It shreds the cotton
As you shredded the lives of so
Many now
Displaced!
Chain-link walls are twisted; bent - backs are broken
Like the bottles from the near-by bar
Where the unemployed spend their checks
And welfare dollars
Because they'll never make
Enough to get out
So why not watch the bubbles
Take their troubles
Up to the sky
Like smoke spirals
From your
Industrial chimneys!
And where is the land that grew the food
You dehydrate and package
So you can send to the victims
Of foreign wars
You started to insure
Your energy resources
That fuel our cars, trains, planes, and
Future wars?
The baby is in a cardboard box
Maybe abandoned
Or maybe just a cradle in the corner
Of the cold-water flat
The cereal is in the cardboard box
But there are little cartoon characters
To cut out
And a toy to play with
While mom is out mopping
And dad is out sweeping!
The cardboard box carries the paper
And the news
Gets printed
On that paper
That paper tells of sorrow
That paper tells of prosperity
That paper burns nicely
When you add a few sticks
So you can warm your hands
By firelight
Before you go to sleep
On the streets!
The cardboard box
Makes a great shelter
If it once housed a refrigerator
For the appliance store
The cardboard box is my boat if I believe it to be;
My car is my coffin if I don't find a warm blanket
For the night
And no one knows my name!
The birds and I cry; the Golden Rod and I nod together
The mist still seeks me out
Though it has to bend and
Stretch harder now that
The buildings block its path!
The morning sun is reddened by pollution
Yet it glows in my heart
And the music I hear
Is not coming from your newly-built symphony hall; the
Art's Center exhibits - no painting as real to me
As the one pervading my pathway
While I walk over
To smell that April violet that somehow found a reason,
And a way
To bloom!
Diane Stirling-Stevens
2/6/1997

early morning sun
rises upon america's
waning empire

precious, unborn babes
murder done in saving's name-
while elders languish

(sung to national anthem tune)

Oh say, can you see it?
I know light is dim
It’s early in the morning
That’s our flag still standing

After all the fighting and shelling.
The bombs dropped all around
And the damn thing still stands
We saw it last night

We watched all the night long
In the glare of the bombs
Now it waves the same way
‘Cept we start wars and kill kids

Hard to have pride when the truth is out
While holding slaves and killing indigenous people

We’ve learned our history
Land of the free and home of the brave.

Play Ball!

At dusk, the fog rolls in just as the Sun hits the horizon.
Making the sky a grayish green, like an ancient plague from God.
I look down the valley of rolling hills, and see nothing.
There are no stars, there is no Moon.
The wet air chills to the bone.
As I walk, it's like walking through a cloud. The quiet is eerie.
The birds are asleep, the animals too.
The creatures of the night have decided to stay home.
I have my mission. I gave my promise to my loved ones.
Strangely, I'm enjoying the murky atmosphere.
There is a restfulness to it, that comforts me.
Still, I dream of sitting in front of a roaring fire,
my dog at my side.
I have reached the graveyard.
The fog seems to be coming out of the ground.
I can hardly see three headstones ahead of me.
The rain starts to fall, like a spray bottle mist.
I hear the Moody Blues in my head.
But all I can think about is my twin brother, who now, is dead.
My shock is gone. There are no more tears.
But the memories flood my mind, unchecked.
The burial is in 16 hours.
My job, to set the simple identifying ground stone,
which I made myself.
Then to cover the hole so it won't be water filled by burial time.
It's raining harder now, but I do my simple, dreary tasks.
From dust, to dust?
He will be going back to be part of the Earth again.
The Earth will engulf him, for it's own purposes.
He was a good man, but I'm not one for saintly eulogies.
I start back. The rain has washed away most of the fog.
The mud is thick now, making my legs tired.
In all this dreariness, I feel good.
The seemingly simple but important task for the family is done.
The weather has matched the atmosphere of the night.
Tomorrow the Sun will be shining.
I will stand in the same place I stood tonight.
I will think good thoughts then,
but tonight I walk in the dark, dark night.

“Now goddamnit, now, as the burning flesh is fresh in our head.
Lord knows we can’t miss our darling reality flick of ineffectuality.
O god forbid we peer beyond the shrub and see death-death-death.
Oh no, can’t have us considering the child’s blood on our hands.
That’d mean we’d need consider our own pitching providence.”
…muttered the rain on the limb-strewn streets as we flipped channels.

Yes! Son of a bitch! Yes! I said “our own pitching providence”!
I say it that one might sneer, snicker and scoff such silliness!

I say it that others might think,
“That guy’s fanatical!”
“That man’s off his meds! This is America!”
“The greatest country on earth!”
“Ours is the sopping land of liberty!”
“The kingdom of all things divine!”

Yes! O goddamnit! Yes! I shout it for the dim-witted inundated in lies!
I utter it for the delusional crouch-down-toad deriding the spirit to speak!
I declare it for it’s in front of us screeching, bloody and boiling!

Look! Look! There! Descending the stairs is this awful something!
This thing, it pours all the magnificence and misery down upon us!
Descending the stairway dripping with the fresh blood of others,
It comes down dripping the hopelessness wrought of greed and arrogance!
Look! Look goddamnit! In its arms it carries the vanishing world!

One-hundred and twenty!
One hundred and twenty lifted by the tall indignity of empire!
Lifted apart by those waiting on god to intervene on their behalf!

We are fools! It is not on our behalf that god shall the earth render still!
It is not on our behalf that the long and towering indignity carts the world!
It’s because of our dishonor that humanity needs such nurturing at all!
Our apathy rivals any in the goddamned history of fouled indifference!

“Now goddamnit, America. Do it now you red-lipped whore of free will.
Start praising your miserable god now, America, now, as the burning flesh is fresh on our hands and we scoff at this; our pitching providence...”
Muttered the rain on the limb-strewn streets as we flipped channels.

a house divided

frustration, anger
ideologies divide
with tea bags and guns

lilies, bunnies, eggs
'prince of peace' resurrection-
spring hypocrisy