“Duuhmm…” (heavy breath) “…well, it’s about jobs and…” (sigh)
Wisconsin’s Burden (Stale Pale Male Scott Walker)
Scott Walker for Prez?
Vote for him at your peril
He’s blind to injustice
His heart has gone sterile
Dim, inarticulate,
slack-jawed mouth-breather
If he ran for dogcatcher,
wouldn’t vote for him either
© 2014 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons by Gage Skidmore; attribution HERE.
People on FOX talk about Scott Walker like he’s the new Ronald Reagan.
I rest my case. The “trickle down” from those policies requires toilet paper… from a company owned (as are Walker and Paul Ryan) by the Koch Brothers.
He (along with equally optimistic Paul “Mr. Schu on Glee” Ryan) are BOTH from Wisconsin. Walker has never worked a job in his life, other than nursing off the taxpayer teat since forever. Walker is running for another term as governor (remember 100,000 protestors at the Capitol Dome in 2011? Yeah, let’s do that again.), and he fully intends to ABANDON that position (or at least totally neglect it) to try for the White House. Even if he still sucks, he won’t be there.
Mary Burke is my choice for governor. Mary Burke ran her family’s business, Trek Bicycle, a nationally known concern that turns out quality bikes. She knows budgets; she understands the need for women to have reproductive care (oh, you don’t favor poor and low-income getting advice from Planned Parenthood? No free condoms? No free birth control pills? Then shut the hell up about “too many babies,” unless you’re willing to adopt them ALL). She knows how to balance a budget. She doesn’t LIE about job creation, and she donated a bunch of money to The Road Home, a path for families from homelessness to housing. YOU GO, GIRL!
Peace, Amy
Fortress in Mind
Secrecy was her secret to survival.
She forgot what happened because
no one talked about it.
Not even her sisters.
She cultivated a rabbit-proof fence
of quietude and dreams,
tracing images in the gritty grain of
their plaster bedroom ceiling.
Why did she only find scared faces?
Grew up in denim armor,
ensuring no boy wanted to date
the girl in the high-top Keds with
“Don’t touch” scrawled in acne.
Landed in Manhattan and
took on a new façade: Approachable.
This, too, was a wall; after all, she’d
“lost it” so long ago, it mattered little
who used her
or when
or where
or how.
All this took place inside
an elaborate labyrinth of hedgerows,
within the castle she had
built in her mind.
The only person who swam in the moat
was her father, he having the privilege
of power, which he exercised unwisely,
unkindly. Unrepentant and unchallenged.
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Sunday Scribblings, the prompt was “fortress.” Also at my poetic fortress, Poets United.
Abusive Remains
Siblings.
Each has their own version of What happened and How,
but most importantly, Why.
Emptied of shame, I still wonder.
Am I sure in my memories?
Have I scratched theme enough to bleed,
to tear a hole deep through to
the beating heart that still skips a beat
when HIS name is mentioned?
Did HE really hang the moon?
Was HE blameless,
spotless?
HE was, after all,
remorseless.
Should I feel guilty? Was I mistaken?
Perhaps I was demon-possessed after all.
One good exorcism and I’d be like new.
One dip in the blood of the Lamb and I’d be reborn… or so she says.
Except, as I drift off to sleep on some nights,
my head still tilts back slooooowly and
my mouth opens and
I am choked in that brutal rhythm.
It was real.
It happened.
It remains.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Poetic Asides asked for poems on the word “Empty,” and ABC Wednesday, rather than reverting to another alphabet, started over with “A.” Also posted at the STELLAR blog, Poets United. Come to all these sites. Meet my genius friends!! Amy
Teacher Says
There was only one reason really to think about
going into fifth grade and start smiling about it
I was getting Mr. Hansen, the teacher I was hoping for
I’ve seen him in his classroom
so tall
so handsome
that five o’clock shadow always, even in the morning
like Don Draper
(Mom tapes Mad Man and I sneak peeks)
I sat up on hot summer nights
imagining chalk sliding across the board
in smoooooooth strokes
It gave me shivers, wishing the chalk was his hand
and I was the chalkboard
School started and I wore my new earrings
because Mom let me pierce my ears for my birthday
Last Thursday afternoon, I asked for extra help
with math – we’re starting to study all the different angles
(My sister calls me obtuse but I still don’t understand why)
He smiled and I could tell he liked that I asked him
For a few minutes, at his desk, just the two of us
Then he brushed his hand on my leg and said,
You shave your legs. That’s pretty grown-up of you.
I blushed and muttered thank you and tingled all over
We’re gonna do the math thing once a week
He said he’s got a way to show me how right angles work
but I shouldn’t tell anybody because the other girls
might get jealous, you know how young girls are, he said
I said, don’t worry, it’ll be our secret
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Wrote this today, no prompt, just something that was in that huge grab-bag of scraps I keep by my desk. It’s like Felix the Cat’s Bag of Tricks – I reach in, pull out a few scribbles, and expand one of the thoughts into a complete poem. Such is the work of this poet. It will, as always, be on Poets United, the poets’ collective. Peace, Amy
Sharp Little Pencil 