Mel Gibson Jack Ford Danica Patrick
they build personal walls as high as the Babel Tower
they probably say variations of F The Common People
thinking they are advancing America by dragging
the gutter talking rambling carcass of Donald John Trump
towards a finish line that isn’t what they imagine
not the climax of a rancid second term in office
to enable them to Keep What’s Theirs
instead they’re pulling Trump towards what he dreads
denials, delays, clang of prison door, silence
Here’s Peter Baker pushing THE NEW YORK TIMES reporter analysis envelope:
Sometimes lost amid all the shouting of a high-octane campaign heading into its final couple of weeks is that simple if mind-bending fact. America for the first time in its history may send a criminal to the Oval Office and entrust him with the nuclear codes. What would once have been automatically disqualifying barely seems to slow Mr. Trump down in his comeback march for a second term that he says will be devoted to “retribution.”
let your Artificial Intelligence do your thinking and deciding for you plus you can put it to work making what Guillermo Del Toro called screensavers but you with little background in art appreciation will call it genius pixel painting then you can feed your AI old movies and movie star photos to create a mediocre teaming of Alan Ladd and Humphrey Bogart and dunderheadedly claim it’s better than movies made with real people and real settings and after that you can fly to a foreign country to not learn the language but speak your native linguistics into a translator app and, once you’ve returned home, yon can tell your math teacher you don’t need to waste hours proving theorems because there’s AI to save time for you and as you persist in believing your Artificial Intelligence is all the computer power you need with no more reason to read and figure and learn, then you’ll find yourself easily led and, eventually, easily enslaved
it was a sign of the End Times
when the Dillards department store
which dressed affluent women and men
was closed justlikethat
and reborn as a gigantic arcade
POSTSCRIPT: The above poem refers to Sikes Senter shopping mall in Wichita Falls, TX. It was built in 1966, then sat empty until October of 1974. What remains (including a Boot Barn, a Hot Topic, a Books-a-Million and an AMC multiplex) will celebrate its 50th anniversary next month.
dead for two weeks
I do feel something
although it doesn’t show
>
all I can say is this:
I didn’t think it would
be quite this soon
and I never imagined
you leaving this world
before my mother and myself
>
things I wanted to tell you outweigh
whatever I did manage through
phone calls and texts
>
at least we were in some kind of contact
not a scenario where we hadn’t spoken in years
he died at 74
never married
one daughter
one granddaughter
child of the keep it to yourself 50s
came of age in generation gap 60s
attracted to women and soft drugs
brought to heel by the county court
cried when he had to cut hair short
and present as nice boy gone bad
>
had a brother nine years younger
far too young to bond with
often separated by parents and miles
learned how to be a salesman
able to get others to believe him
as long as others weren’t mother father relatives
>
but he loved sports
collected memorabilia
graduated from University of Texas Austin
spent his retirement going to various sporting events
this took his mind off declining health
and being denied access to granddaughter
by daughter who sometimes preferred him at arm’s length
>
passed away a day following minor traffic accident
began eternal sleep in a duplex protecting him
from Central Texas humidity outside
turn away from sparklers waved by gotcha interrogators
don’t fall for lies told by the cemetery desecrators
there’s no reason to again wallow in the Pit of Venality
we must be better than this
read this phrase from a living poet eulogizing a deceased poet:
went to local poetry readings when there were good ones
>
I knew the deceased poet and he was kind to me
even though I was nowhere close to his level of accomplishment
and I knew he wouldn’t write a sentence eulogizing someone
with the phrase I quoted from the Eminent Living Poet
>
to me, all the local readings I attended were good ones
you learn from the best, the mid-level and the worst
and there are talks to talk and walks to walk
even if you choose to talk and walk
without a feverish despair for what may be fickle acceptance
