Friday, October 22

Works in Progress, 12

1.
maneuvering around car-sized potholes

designing legal strategies
speaking solely in terms of racial justice
examining burial pits and naked skulls

2.
sticking to issues that directly affect them

bemoaning the cautiousness of today's athletes
co-opting the arguments of their opposition
tracking Latino immigrants at the border

3.
supporting any effort to unionize

failing to generate meaningful responses
feeling the centipede in oneself
getting some good poems out of it

4.
rewriting the country's labor laws

seeing a psychic map of our obsessions
building electoral coalitions that will win
emphasizing the overlapping interests of the affluent

5.
slumbering until nightfall

setting this brain of mine afire
reaching irritably after fact & reason
shunning easy consolations

6.
subsidizing extinction industries

helping women victimized by male violence
doubling the sign-up bonus for volunteers
supporting the troops while doubting the war

7.
naming the dead

waiting for him to break silence
descending the steeps of the soughing twilight
assimilating foreign cultures

8.
freeing the slaves

admonishing those who do evil
stamping out political brushfires
democratizing the US

9.
getting in touch with the cable guys

swinging the birches
testing the waters
pushing radical music agendas

10.
getting out the vote

fetching water from the well
educating the masses
confessing to our personal demons

11.
clearing minefields from past wars

laying them for wars yet to come
staying executions, pardoning the innocent
blurring the boundaries, the borders

12.
reading maps in the dark with the top light off

folding them all back up rightly
cramming them into the glove compartment
getting moving again in the right direction

13.


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