- Non-Erotic Poetry
- Kate Smith Talks Back to the Mirror
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Click hereAmerica? Remember when
we were young and I could still
jump high enough to catch
lightning bugs in a jar
without straining my knees?
You looked so proud once
before the gloaming,
the allure of your trees
half unbuttoned. It was no accident
when leaves bloomed
in that ancient ritual,
always coaxing summer
from the hard freeze of remorse.
Remember when we ducked
and covered, stacked cans of Spam
in backyard bunkers, played combat
for ant hills and bid you
sweet dreamsicles?
Those were the days, eh America?
Once upon a time passed
like time and not some made for tv
special. Remember when we didn't need
to film reality or cry on cue?
That was before we drove you
to the streets, slapped
your stars silly, battered
you with tear gas and made bruises
of your silly anthem.
We worried over times tables
and state capitals, not your ugly
restricted lunch counters
and nightmare sheets. Life
could be a dream, America
but you wouldn't
take us up to paradise.
You dragged us screaming
across oceans into burning
rice paddies all the while
singing about amber waves of grain
while Tony the red-faced boy
from Algebra 1 lay face down
in said paddy never again
to wake by the dawn's early light.
So excuse me for being tired
of your strident platitudes,
your moral majority, your go-get-em,
ass-kickin, yeehaw optimism.
I need a nap now, America.
I'm getting too old
for this roller coaster
nationalism. Turn off the light
on your way out, would you,
and we'll both say a prayer
that God will bless somebody,
somewhere.
- COMMENTS
I think the risk in what others have called "political poems" is that the subject matter is so temporary. Yet, Kate Smith was iconic whose fame coincided with the beginning of commercial television and whose history I believe will always be chronicled. So I think you chose wisely and the poem had an intriguing narrative that followed, at least for me. I identify closely with what was happening in the fifties and often have written about it as well.
I might have attempted to be a little less direct towards the end while at the same time conveying the same disappointment. Of course, that's easier said than done.
I think few get the Kate Smith (1907-1986) reference, but it is well chosen. I like this piece for its stark images. I remember most of them and wonder why so many who are old enough either do not, or just weren't paying attention the first time.
A little pro USA for my tastes (in Aussie we view you lot with some apprehension politically). I relate to the bit about Tony the redfaced kid. An annoying classmate of my sister was Aussie's first casuality in Afghanistan (another reason I am apprehensive). Well written though and I give you props for use of the word gloaming.
way too
way too
So excuse me for being tired
of your strident platitudes,
way too platitude in us?
There will always be anti war songs and poems and this should be up there with the best, one that I would love to read over and over. Shift a few words and contexts around and it could apply to my country too. Praying for peace seems to be all that we can do and hope that one day someone somewhere will actually listen to the people
and is of this one, however much he might agree with the politics. As such, he thinks this one well done, but not the kind of thing that would appeal to him as much as a silly love poem, or a picture of swans on a lake. Perhaps it is the transitory nature of politics. Perhaps it is his lunch not settling quite right.
As he said, well done, though. Let Poet Guy leave his own political sentiment for Ms. Smith, cribbed from the valedictory of a confused soldier:
Put out the light, and then put out the Right:
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore.
What a great ode to a great lady and a great country. I like the way each stanza is a small history all its own and the way you tie it all up so neatly in the final verse. The title is perfect too.
You haven't lost your poetic touch while writing prose.
Tess