Showing posts with label Imitations of Morality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Imitations of Morality. Show all posts

Sunday, November 4, 2012

IN CASE YOU HADN'T NOTICED...

...we have an election coming up.  I can't think of better commentary than the poem below, once again by Marthe G. Walsh.  I guess I should name Marthe poet laureate of Wounded Bird...or something. 

                                                 Imitations of Morality

The scratch of gust blown leaves, stubborn yellows, brown
the last of reds rusted on their way to mud
            just beyond the pavement’s crown
               of civility, the thud
of campaign weary feet tracking voters down
in last gasp desperation of fanatic
            assertions of perfection
               possible in election,
    ignore the gush of faulty candidates erratic.

The patch of virtue tended, meant for harvest
by the flame of ultra-conservative torch
            is but withered interest
               in protecting those who scorch
the very fabric of the soul to invest
with new authority a male government
            not just hostile to women,
               dismissive of each human
   without a suit of cash to cover raw resentment
of all “those people” living their own way,
without permission, without the “guidance”,
            rule of oppressive patriarchs sway,
               smug and proud of their own ignorance
that in secret makes them nervous of prey
turning to stare down the profit stalker,
            challenge the right of a small elite
               to take, to hoard, to gorge on red meat
   while masses starve at the table of the slick talker.

The long, slow fall of a losing argument
turns to an early, ancient, mean, strategy
            of claiming to know God’s intent,
               noblesse oblige theology
that strips away a woman’s right to consent,
to control her own body, the intimate
            used to intimidate, shame, unhinge,
               the tactic of unholy fringe
   threshing force from rape to see sacred seed proximate.

The thatch of suspect false ideology leaks
and rots in the rain of words worth remembering:
            Truth from clouds of glory peeks,
             trails the liar dissembling,
clings like the stench of death while greed prevails and speaks
as if justice were the exclusive property
            of any self-proclaimed elect.
               Truth shines, the timid to protect,
   through fog of moneyed might to reveal equality,
       not some fleeting, fashionable stance or politic,
       just neighbor loving neighbor without fright dogmatic.