do you think it’s funny
hilarious, haha, a joke
how a billionaire’s money
is enough to make him an expert
on how to put his hands
around your throat
until you choke
how your taxes should be spent
and who should be sent away
to another place
to disappear without a trace
sold into slavery
or worse
to another time
when people were schooled
that rich white men ruled and
everyone else was
easily fooled
where women stayed
in the kitchen all day
preferably naked
and always ready to play
nobody was welcome
unless they could pay
their five million dollar
fee to stay
does it make you giggle
when our president
rants and raves
stomps his feet
and holds his breath
until his face
turns orange
says that only he
knows what’s best
for the billionaires
because quite frankly
no one cares about
all the rest
everyone must bow down
lay down
stay down
or get put down
orange marmalade
like fentanyl laced Gatorade
breaks the spirit
numbs the mind
until you find
you’re on the floor
too weak to
care anymore
Tag: truth
The only truth is love…
When my first child was born I asked him, “What role will you play in the world?”
He said to me, “I will show the world where to look for truth.”
When my second child was born I asked her, “What role will you play in the world?”
She replied, “I will teach the children to learn the truth.”
When my third child entered the world I asked him, “What role will you play in the world?”
He told me, “I will tell the world how to live their life in truth.”
When my last child was born I asked him, “What role will you play in the world?”
He answered, “I will show the world the beauty that lies in truth.”
My wife asked me, “What role did we play in the world?”
I told her, “We gave them the passion to seek the truth.”
What Decade Is It
It seems we have traveled a very long way
Just to end up where we started from
Still taking most from all
And giving it all to some
The incompetent march and all cry foul
They say that soon their time will come
But let me tell you a tale of a long time ago
When the people partied, sang and danced
They all drove their cars to the cities
Just looking for some romance
But all the women they found there
Wouldn’t give them half a chance
The farmers all hated the factories
For putting their women on the job
The white men hated the blacks
They said they were nothing but a mob
The Catholics hated everyone else
While the rule makers just polished their knob
The new women said they knew what was best
That their mothers had it all wrong
The politicians praised how all the people
Worked together to make America strong
It was the poor that wrote the words
But it was the rich who sang the songs
So I ask if any one of us
Will ever know just what to do
In a country where the left says they’re right
But the right says that they are too
And up in the big house around the corner
Lies are touted as the gospel truth
Childproof caps…
So here’s the thing guys. Everybody knows by now that I’m an old geezer. I don’t try to hide it, in fact I use it to my advantage the best I can. But, I also have arthritis in my hands pretty bad along with several other afflictions that we won’t go into today. So I take what seems to be a semi-truck full of medications. Like all Americans, I have to purchase them at the cheapest place possible. That means Costco Home Delivery (your welcome Costco for the free publicity). My apologies to the local pharmacies but evil insurance makes me do it.
So where was I…oh yeah?
Because I buy my drugs online, they gave me the option to order them with regular screw on lids. Of course, being old and feeble, I chose yes. I assumed they realized that because I had arthritis it would be difficult for me to open the childproof lids. So I thanked them for their concern and left the website thinking how considerate they were for thinking of my well-being.
Well, my package arrived a few days later. A plastic bag sealed up tighter than an armored tank. After a search through various junk drawers to find a pair of scissors I managed to finally get the contents dumped onto the table. It appears that in the world of online medication the motto is, “why use one bottle when you can use three instead?” Yes, three bottles for every prescription and each one neatly sealed with a childproof cap. My immediate thought was that I had made an error in the ordering process. I’m old and that’s what happens to me a lot. But then, lo and behold, underneath the whole thing was another plastic bag filled with my screw on lids.
What am I to do I wondered. Then the answer hit me. I would enlist the help of the one person that I was sure could remove the caps with ease. So I asked the neighbors 5 year old daughter to give me a helping hand. Remember folks, if you have childproof caps, you better have a child around to get them open.
Jason…
Janice has withdrawn into herself again. She’s setting there on our yard sale couch staring into a TV that isn’t even on. With the old quilt, that our grandmother made, wrapped tight around her; though it’s eighty degrees in our trailer. Her face is sunken and her skin hangs lose from fragile bones. Like all the emotions have been sucked away from her and left her deflated.
I sit down next to her and she leans into me, resting her head on my shoulder. We set for an eternity in our silence just staring at the floating specs of dust in the sunshine. It’s like we’re frozen inside a snow globe.
“I hate Fridays,” she says to me. I smile because I know she’s trying to push away the ugliness that is shrouding her.
“I know Jan.” I tell her, because really I do.
It was three years ago on a Friday that I found you huddled in the woods, just off the path that we used as a shortcut from school. We took that path everyday together…except that Friday. That Friday, I wasn’t there for you because that Friday I tried out for that fucking school play. I found you there, shaking so hard I was afraid your bones would shatter. Your head was in your hands and the tears burning the scuff marks on your cheeks. I heard you whispering between your sobs, “No, no, please no.”
You were only twelve years old and collapsed into a pile of flesh and bones. Left discarded in the woods like some wounded animal. I found you there, with your clothes covered in your own blood. Your innocents ripped from your soul. You wrapped your fists tight into my sweater as I picked you up. Your eyes squeezed shut because you never wanted to look at anything again. There would be no beauty left for you in this world. I carried your trembling body in my arms. Your convulsions were so heavy that you vomited onto my cloths; your tears so large they washed it away again. Your short wisps of breath floated into the night sky along with all your dreams. All I could do was tell you that it was going to be okay…but I knew it never would.
While you searched for some answer, you cried, “Oh God, why, why?”
I don’t think God will ever give us those answers my dear sister, but I will always hate him for taking your childhood away.
Jerry Brotherton 