Hi there.
Before getting to today’s poem, here’s a brief life update and word about future posts:
I’m moving! Again. For the third time in as many years. This time it’s by choice, and into a home my wife and I will actually own for the first time in our lives — as much as we can own anything in this transient life afforded to us by the earth and cosmos, at least. Still, I’m anticipating a ton of logistical and physical coordination around this in the next one to two months, which may well affect my ability to continue posting poems daily as intended. I’ll try to keep up at least every other day, but this will depend on where my body and mind are at each morning after the preceding day’s events.
Though born of necessity, this may prove a good transition to what I’m thinking for this blog for next year. My goal this year was to post a poem every weekday, which I’ve been able to keep up with most of the time, but I’ll be honest that I think the quality of my poems suffered as a result. So, looking forward, I’m planning to switch to posting one, perhaps more fully-realized poem per week, complete with life and work updates such as these, and one essay per month, with subject matter ranging from the personal to universal, bioregion-specific foraging advice to global cultural criticism. More details to come soon.
Thanks for continuing to read and support me as my creative voice and outlet keep evolving. Share, subscribe, love yourself, love each other, and all the other good things. Now, a poem about how screwed up the institutions we’re forced to rely on to orient our lives are!
Our state won't pay to heal people at home,
But never fails to fund killing abroad
And finance the manufacture of soldiers
Who swear they would for us.
We mourn when they meet their match
And make stickers of at home
While they suffer in the gutters
Trying to define the distinction between foreign and domestic,
Civilian or combatant.
So tell me,
Why would I keep around a relationship
That would rather prove a point than keep me alive?
As protection against their enemies who'd do the same?
I've seen enough mob movies not to play that game.
If anyone's going to put me in harm's way,
It'll be me.
You, who claim to keep me free,
Are they, who made me into property.
Now, as ever, the law is breaking
And the order out to sea.
The philosophy that seeks to prove belief
Anticipates its own reprisal,
As Apocalypse ends every Bible. C?