After the debates in the NYS Gubernatorial race, I was soooo pleased that Poetic Asides posted the prompt, “What I Like About…” This is an equal opportunity offender! Even the Dems get it in the butt!
WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THE 2010 NYS RACE FOR GUV
Sure, Cuomo’s in
but I watched the debates anyway
Hoping to see Paladino explode
but he ran offstage to do his exploding in the men’s room
He must have been tranquilized
I didn’t hear a single remark about gays being damned or that his son is STRAIGHT, dammit
I have no horse in this race
since the all-but crowned winner
is same old, same old
and his daddy held the office first
and I saw how that played out in the White House
But the also-rans were great
A former madame for the Anti-Prohibition Party
who, while endorsing legalized marijuana and casinos,
did not endorse legalizing prostitution
Now there’s a confused person
The RENT IS TOO DAMN HIGH Party
I swear, I couldn’t make this stuff up
Col Sanders is now black
andtalkssofastyoucanhardlykeepup
And while rent may BE high
I cannot in good conscience give them my vote
Because the correct name should be
The Rent Is Too DAMNED High Party
I hate bad grammar
Loved the Greens cause they love the earth
Great agenda on the environment
They understand that ‘hydro-fracturing’
is actually ‘hydro-chemicals-including-methane-fracturing’
You can’t frack without chemicals
As Starbuck would say, “Don’t frack with me”
Libertarian, suitably stern
Would privatize everything
and we’d watch our houses burn
if we didn’t keep up our fire dept. payments
Cuomo, silk-suitably smug
Talked like a weiner
I mean winner
There were more candidates, I think
But these were the standouts
I’m going to start my own party
and call it:
The Price Of Prostitutes Is Too Damn High/Don’t Frack With Me/Legalize Pot/Tax The Rich Til They’re Poor/Health Care For All/If You Want To Wear A Hijab or Other Arabic Dress In Public, Juan Williams Will Have To Get The Hell Over It
…Party
This week at Writer’s Island, we were asked to think about masquerades. First one was heavy, so I decided it was time for a little more fun. Easy, my Tea Party friends, it’s just a poem! Amy
SCARY COSTUME
This year, Halloween’s too easy
Red suit, sharp and stiff, not sleazy
Hair up in a shiny bun
Posture of a warring Hun
Sensible dark-rimmed wire glasses
Worn especially for the masses
“Shopped around, I’m really smart
Picked them up at our WalMart”
Smile until my lips vibrate
Platitudes at rapid rate
Kids, I’ll drag along behind
tied up to my butt with twine
Red high heels from Macy’s, dear
(“WalMart”? Not with my career!)
Vacant stare and “Yeah, you betcha”
Look out! Sarah’s gonna getcha!
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore, Sharp Little Pencil
WHATEVER COMES (for Poets United)
Whatever you think about me
I am human
I have feelings
Feelings that have been stomped on
or caressed
depending on the person and circumstance
I am an American from Europe
whose white skin
and heterosexuality
and youth in the suburbs
gave me advantages
over those who weren’t dealt the same cards
or even given cards from the same deck
I am a woman who still doesn’t have
the same Constitutional rights as males
but who can vote and speak her mind
who doesn’t have to wear a burqa
who doesn’t risk being stoned to death
because she dared leave the house without her husband
I am not threatened by TV personalities
who admit they don’t believe half their hate speech
(they are just doing what their sponsors tell them)
who have no degrees in journalism
(one a college dropout, the other a deejay)
They don’t speak from their hearts
but from their wallets
and they freely admit it
Sure, it’s mercenary and incites violence
But it’s a living
Powers of such as these are limited
only by the willingness of their listeners
to be sheep, to blame the least in our society
for their current woes
(this time it’s Mexicans and gays; last time it was Jews;
before that, Armenians, before that…)
When Jesus was surrounded by “unclean” street urchins
he told the disciples not to chase them away
but to let them come closer
He didn’t want them deported to another town
He didn’t call them unclean or unworthy
He didn’t charge co-pays when healing the poor
He acted out of love
He also raised a ruckus
that resonates to this very day
for to love one’s enemies is an almost impossible task
and to love one’s neighbor,
harder still when he brags he ran them over,
but they were “just Mexicans”
Jesus was hung because of words
and all his words were loving
If our poetic world was only Whitman, Dickinson, Dickens
bereft of Ginsburg, Baraka, Gwendolyn Brooks
how poor this world would be
Provocation is healthy
What makes one’s blood course faster
makes one’s mind more nimble
Sure, I get provoked
But I stand by my right as an artist
to call out powerful hate-mongers
Plato banned poets because
he claimed they drew their inspiration
from imaginary worlds
Those of us who draw from the real world
do so in the name of justice
of compassion for the Other
regardless of religion or color
regardless of the consequences
in spite of whatever comes
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Between the Tea Party Birther who so ignorantly “accused” the president of HAVING AN ARABIC MIDDLE NAME (like it’s a crime?) and the plethora of poets who aren’t listening to anyone besides The Three Stooges (Moe – Sarah Palin; Curly – Glenn “Mr Potatohead” Beck; Larry – Rush), it’s time for some Fair And Balanced poetry!! Amy
THE CYCLE OF MISINFORMATION
An Austrian and a German walk into a bar
and put their heads together
Repeat the falsehood often enough
and it becomes the truth
especially if the public is so distracted by their
financial misery that they will believe anything
blame anyone
for their problems
A Texan and a Texan walk into an office
and put their heads together
Make one Texan from Wyoming, repeat, rinse
and it becomes a ticket
especially if the public is so confused by ballots that
they will believe anything Diebolt says
agree with anyone
so long as their fortunes are safe
An African American man walks into the White House
and the cockroaches are no longer afraid of the light
Say the president isn’t American, isn’t a Christian
and it becomes the truth
especially if a draft dodger and a college dropout say so
and the public is so willing to believe them
and the Lady in Red says “You betcha!”
And now the debt from the war
that was put on a Chinese credit card by the Texans
(in place of real homeland security, like health care
and educating our kids)
Is blamed on the new president (doesn’t he know his place?)
because they can and they own the media
and most self-aggrandizing Christians don’t have Muslim friends
As someone once said,
It’s so heartening to see one prejudice
replaced by another
(c) 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
(I’m off to Binghamton to play a gospel coffeehouse at Our Saviour Lutheran Church in Endwell, NY, Sat 9/18 at 6 pm. Please come if you’re in the area. I’ll leave a poem here and see you when I get back on Tuesday! Amy)
POOR LITTLE ORPHAN GIRL
Poor little orphan girl
Daddy went to war
to protect and defend capitalism
on Wall Street
Mommy’s pedicure was 10:45 sharp
Then brunch, pedicures, and bloody marys
In the park under a golden maple
Baby sits on an ample lap
Touches the sweet brown face
of her best friend, Sofia, who’s
undocumented, underpaid
Far from her own Filipino family
Two orphan girls
sit on a Manhattan park bench
legs swinging
tossing bread crumbs to
las palomas
(c) 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Reaction to a spirited debate regarding politics and poetry.
WHATEVER COMES
Whatever you think about me
I am human
I have feelings
Feelings that have been stomped on
or caressed
depending on the person and circumstance
I am an American from Europe
whose white skin
and heterosexuality
and youth in the suburbs
gave me advantages
over those who weren’t dealt the same cards
or even given cards from the same deck
I am a woman who still doesn’t have
the same Constitutional rights as males
but who can vote and speak her mind
who doesn’t have to wear a burqa
who doesn’t risk being stoned to death
because she dared leave the house without her husband
I am not threatened by TV personalities
who admit they don’t believe half their hate speech
(they are just doing what their sponsors tell them)
who have no degrees in journalism
(one a college dropout, the other a deejay)
They don’t speak from their hearts
but from their wallets
and they freely admit it
Sure, it’s mercenary and incites violence
But it’s a living
Powers of such as these are limited
only by the willingness of their listeners
to be sheep, to blame the least in our society
for their current woes
(this time it’s Mexicans and gays; last time it was Jews;
before that, Armenians, before that…)
When Jesus was surrounded by “unclean” street urchins
he told the disciples not to chase them away
but to let them come closer
He didn’t want them deported to another town
He didn’t call them unclean or unworthy
He didn’t charge copays when healing the poor
He acted out of love
He also raised a ruckus
that resonates to this very day
for to love one’s enemies is an almost impossible task
and to love one’s neighbor,
harder still when he brags he ran them over,
but they were “just Mexicans”
Jesus was hung because of words
and all his words were loving
If our poetic world was only Whitman, Dickenson, Dickens
bereft of Ginsburg, Baraka, Gwendolyn Brooks
how poor this world would be
Provocation is healthy
What makes one’s blood coarse faster
makes one’s mind more nimble
Sure, I get provoked
But I stand by my right as an artist
to call out powerful hatemongers
Plato banned poets because
he claimed they drew their inspiration
from imaginary worlds
Those of us who draw from the real world
do so in the name of justice
of compassion for the Other
regardless of religion or color
regardless of the consequences
in spite of whatever comes
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
FEAR (a limerick)
Since 2001, there’ve been panics
‘bout Arabs and gays and Hispanics
But never you fear
You will stay calm and clear
Just as long as you keep taking Xanax
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
We were asked to write about winter or cold. Poets went from temperatures to coldness of heart to…
COLD AS A SWASTIKA
And when they had gathered all the books
Works of Jewish and other subversive writers
Thoughts of Einstein
Dark musings of playwright Bertolt Brecht
(every time you hum “Mack the Knife,” remember him)
Lenin, Trotsky, Zola (politics)
From Sigmund Freud to Ernest Hemingway
Ironically, Jack London’s Arctic went into the pile
And then the pyre – everyone pulled out matches to participate in
a funeral worthy of a ship-bound Viking
The death of thousands of words
too dangerous to read
Thoughts polluting the minds of
pure-blooded, ‘real’ Germans
The chill pored over intellectuals
Jews and Christians alike
Frozen in time, these works
Alive elsewhere, but here during the Nazi regime
forbidden fruit
Icewater veins of torch-wielding youth
who, had they read the books
might have understood what was going wrong
Here, in America
that same icy atmosphere prevails
over “Harry Potter”
over “Huck Finn”
over “Catcher in the Rye”
We don’t burn ’em; we ban ’em
And the North wind keeps on blowing
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
PalinDrone
I ran for Vice President
while killing a moose with an assault rifle
from a helicopter
during labor for my 28th child!
But my daughter flunked her abstinence class
While not as glamorous as the White House
Fox News gives me lots of air time
I go to lots of Tea Parties
and I finally got rid of Todd
Running for President? I’ll get back to ya!
I like to shop at consignment stores
like Bonwit Teller, you betcha
and Macy’s and Tiffany’s
But my favorite accessory is Trig
I carry him around like a badge
(c) 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
written for the Pyramid prompt at Poetic Asides
Thoughts about the Obama presidency and the dearth – not the death – of activism. Time to wake up!
CHANGE 2009
He stood to take the oath of office
Both the white guy and the biracial guy blew the oath
but an Asian cellist became a rock star that day
Miles of humanity surrounded the Capitol
Standing as one and chanting,
“Yes we can! Yes we can!”
Now, a year later, half are disillusioned and
too damned lazy to call their legislators or take action
They should have been shouting, “Yes HE can!”
He can’t do it alone
The road to change is long, deeply furrowed and
littered with sharp stones (lest you cut your foot)
Change doesn’t come from a place of comfort
especially your own smug armchair in front of a plasma TV
Change comes hard. Raise your voices. Get off your asses.
YES. WE. CAN.
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Sharp Little Pencil 