FOR BRAD

Is anybody really better
Than Cheney/Bush for President?
Aren’t each of them a tough goal setter
For making sure the world’s torment
Is harnessed so that every bitcher
Is slapped down so the rich get richer?
Obama, Clinton, John McCain-
You really think they feel the pain?
Or do they work for corporations
Who, after all, pay all their bills
To fatten up a world of ills
So that they do the renovations,
Based solely on the lowest bid?
Least that's what Halliburton did.

NOW THAT WOULD BE NEWS

1
Do any think the notoriety
Is merited? It makes me retch.
It says a lot about society
That Spears and Co. can etch-
With camera shots by paparazzi
Who swoop in like they’re kamikaze-
Upon our minds the common things
Like dining out on chicken wings.
It might be news if witless Paris
Was pictured with her granddad's watch
The fob of which hung out her crotch.
Or, better yet, this flighty heiress
Who when they gave her crotch a click
It was revealed she had a dick!
2
But either way the notoriety
Is so insulting when compared
To those who benefit society.
These airheads who have hardly bared
Their pussies for a peek-a-booing
(Not even offering a screwing)
Want glory for the ill repute
Of flashing their forbidden fruit.
Attention deficit disorder
Which means how quickly we forget
Who wears the current coronet
Can be revived with a ripsnorter-
Don’t want to be dumped with junk mail,
Then do some time in county jail.
3
Our first celebrities were preachers.
In Sunday services out West,
They offered us both double features
And chances to relieve repressed
Desires and instincts we kept swaddled.
But Sundays these, released and coddled,
Were given birth from out the wombs
Of preachers- our Orlando Blooms.
Imagine life in Oklahoma-
The endless days of endless chores
The endless nights of husbands’ snores
And wishing you were in a coma.
Except for Sundays when desire
Was lit up by the preacher’s fire.
4
For preachers preached about the sinning
The Bible damned as so much lust.
A woman needed disciplining,
Though how was never much discussed.
On lonely nights she’d see her preacher
And dream about his creature feature;
How she might take it well in hand
And lead it to her Holy Land.
But dreams demand our understanding
Especially when her husband’s might
Was dead before the fall of night.
This left the preacher last man standing-
And he could teach her discipline
And pray forgiveness for their sin.

( to be continued )
,

PRIVATIZING EDUCATION

1
You’ll ask why I'm antagonistic
To privatizing government?
It’s not just that I’m communistic;
But am a diehard malcontent
Who does believe that a democracy
Is better than an aristocracy
Of corporations who’ll pig off
Our taxes like a public trough.
Take Kipp and Green Dot Education-
With monies from both Gates and Broad-
Who argue schooling’s public mode
Is at the end of its duration;
And will be, too, if we give way.
Without a fight,they’re here to stay.
2
They base their plans on high stakes testing
Which likely’s a norm referenced test;
Which means, in turn, they’ll be investing
Only in children who do best.
And with them, education’s axis-
Which is a portion of all’s taxes-
Is siphoned off from public schools
So that what’s left looks like Kabul’s.
And then these self-fulfilling prophets-
Because norm referencing makes sure
Who does the worst are very poor-
Will gladly show how it pays off. It’s
Certain to give a new gestalt
To poor folks thinking: “It’s our fault.”
3
No doubt that being poor’s arresting.
But public education is
Supposed to help your kids. Investing
In schools as if they were a biz
By using public funds dismisses
Most poor kids down to such abysses
It’s little wonder that they fight
To get out of the awful fright
That passes for their education.
It’s teachers though should take the lead
In helping them escape the greed
That rapes the coffers of taxation.
But organizing teacherkind
Requires a union of one mind.

ON THE EVE OF THE OHIO AND TEXAS PRIMARIES

Should any care for our elections
When corporations pay the cost
And buy the candidates’ affections?
You don’t think you’ve been double-crossed?
Which one will stop the privatizing
Of government reorganizing
So corporations’ appetites
Won’t swallow up our human rights?
The rights to health care, education-
Which candidate’s the wherewithal
To stop them going to the wall
When they’ve received a fat donation
From companies that pay the tolls
So they access our lives and souls?

A MEDITATION ON SATIRE

Not true that satire’s misanthropical!
But all men live within their time
And so, of course, it must be topical
And taken with a spit of rhyme.
Who claims a satire’s for the ages
Belongs in one of Bedlam’s cages;
Who claim that men have no frontier
But are the same from yesteryear
Must worship at the criticism
They say devolved from Sigmund Freud
That claims our future’s null and void.
All satire with its witticism
Hopes that its butts will bid good-byes
To running off counterclockwise.

BILL BUCKLEY-R.I.H.

So William Buckley’s been sent lugging
His baggage off the train. He’s dead.
And now he’s with the devil plugging
His best book, “Better Dead Than Red.”
Of course the devil will be civil,
Though all that Buckley wrote was drivel,
Since any who would fall from grace
To hell as final resting place
Deserve a moment of reflection
To meditate upon their sins
Before their final fall begins.
Bill will, no doubt, make his objections-
“Conservatives who have raised hell
Should not be dropped…” but down he fell.

THE HUMAN STAIN

I’ve listened to procrastinations
From pols who want to end a war;
But can’t before they’ve laid foundations
For friendly folks to mind the store;
Until the “natives” know that voting
Is done with ballots not exploding
Rounds clipping people in their guts
And leaving them with nothing butts.
Imagine England interfering
With Yankee voters. Oops. They tried.
We fought like terrorists. They died.
So when they’re done electioneering
Whoever wins-Barack McCain-
We voted for more human stain.