Post-Pubescent Homeland Insecurity
(From The Triumph of Strife: an homage to Dante Alighieri and Percy Shelley)

His tiny testes drip testosterone
Secreting droplets of the manly bile
Inspiring him to tap into your phone

To demonstrate his craftiness and guile
Lest tens of millions of our citizens
Connect in conversation for awhile

To criticize the dumbass denizens
Whom he has granted access to our books
Some loyalists brought up in Party pens

Some Party hacks: incompetents and crooks
Who cannot seem to grasp the basic fact
Of how completely stupid this all looks:

Hauled in by their own net of missing tact
Reactionary trolls caught in the act

Like Barney Fife, the deputy, still green
George works for Sheriff Cheney, one-eyed Jack,
The other side of whose face we have seen

Deciding which new countries to attack
Ambushing captive quail from point-blank range
And stabbing secret agents in the back

Because they will not knowingly estrange
The truth from what they think of as their work
To mollify mad mongrels with the mange

Factotums who for presidents will clerk
Exceptions all, they claim immunity
For presidents who wage war as a perk

Like Bill who in his lust for legacy
Screwed up and bombed a Chinese embassy

With homicides committed on his watch
And no one held accountable on high
Into his belt George carves another notch

To celebrate the flaws that let him spy
On millions of his docile, craven folk
Who've let him spit in their collective eye

Who much prefer the bridle and the yoke
Who'd never leave the safety of the cage
Who've made of their proud heritage a joke

Whose blood would never boil in righteous rage
When government comes knocking at the door
Or taps the phone and scans the written page

For "evidence" of what they most abhor:
That some among us won't crawl on the floor

He got the war he wanted so to lead;
His carpetbagging cronies cashed their chits
But now his soldiers daily die and bleed

So now in panic mode his pants he shits
Yet still so full of crap his eyes turn brown
Our laws his lies have broken into bits

To save himself he'll pull the country down
As misery loves company he clings
To any silken straw or gauzy gown

He thinks will bear outrageous fortune's slings
And shield his mind against the nobler choice
A sorry, solipsistic song he sings

To be or not to be, his Hamlet's voice
Chokes in paralysis while foes rejoice

Our friends won't trust us if we don't act dumb
And enemies won't fear us if we think
So "stay the curse" and set your brains to "numb"

"Stand up!" "Stand down!" Jump headfirst in the drink!
Spout Fearful Leader's slogans by the book!
Skate round and round the rabid roller rink!

Just never open up your eyes and look
For fear of what you'll see in your own face
Reflected in the reason you forsook

When you let stupid people take your place
To formulate your thoughts for you this way
No memory remains for you to trace

But since it sold back in a bygone day
Why not regurgitate the same today?

The "oil spots" and the "dominoes" return
The "flypaper," George Custer, draws the bugs
He takes the low ground just to see it burn

His men absorb the flying, deadly slugs
And Arab Injuns improvise like Sioux
His women take it right between the jugs

And lose appendages like fellows do
The boys and girls could sure use our support
So send them on another tour or two

While George vacations at his ranch resort
And rides the flatland on his mountain bike
Completely safe from any rude retort

The kind that pampered princes never like:
Demanding their crowned heads upon a spike

They hang inverted from a swaying pole
With tar and feather garments for a skin
The snake-oil salesmen play their fated role

For selling rubbing alcohol as gin
And hyping "splendid little wars" as cheap
To be financed by passing round the tin

Which leaves some future citizens to reap
The taxes paying interest on the loans
For costs now piling up in such a heap

The future robbed before it even moans
The present spent and wasted on a bet
Las Vegas sags beneath the spoils and groans

While busted gamblers haven't figured yet
Just why they ride the bus and not the jet

Michael Murry, "The Misfortune Teller," Copyright 2006-2010