BALLROOM (revised version)

BALLROOM

we Brits (was once Brit)
two centuries ago
torched
your White House

but now
the special relationship
all is forgiven
all is
forgotten

and now, anyway, you
hard at work
knocking it down
(Donald confesses to
loving that sound)

but soon
to be revised, restored,
resurrected
into a glorious ballroom,
divinely beautiful
fit not
   just for a King
but for a god

place
for the elite
to meet
meat of the elite

one thing
   about the true elite
will swear
to the media, to all
who might listen.
they are,
so bog
ordinary
      which terrible taste
kind of confirms
that they are
and here
     beneath this gloss
something exquisitely shabby

yet be
that as it may
everyone
will
    fall over themselves
to be
first
to proclaim it a people’s palace,

open
to all
   and sundry just
so long
   as they be corporate, so
long as they bank billions

fantastic fever dream structure
that simply
      pulls out all the stops

promises to give you
space to
    express yourself to
trip the light
fantastic
     waltz, tango, whiskey, Charlie,
delta

Lightnings, Eagles, Tomcats,
Apaches

whatever your wings
enough floor here to park on

rivalling
    the USS Enterprise for
deck
   to take off and land

returning from bombing runs
on incalcitrant blue cities
the governance
        of America
not
   leaving to chance

that no one
     will
dance
out of step
           play
different tune,

mess
   with the waltz

rewrite
    the text of this sacred script

that gave
     us the blueprint for
this insatiable dream

and in the realization
of which

because money isn’t real
you need so much of it

MY LECTURE ON SATIRE

MY LECTURE ON SATIRE

I was lecturing on satire
fancying myself
up on the stage
behind the podium

but
then

inexplicably
began to satirize myself

tear strips off
launch a monstrous attack
bombard with
vicious jokes about
my total lack of ability
limited intelligence

which I
would share with you

were it not
so viciously brilliant
beyond your comprehension
way outside
your linguistic abilities

far above
your mere mortal
everyday pay grade

SERIOUSLY

SERIOUSLY

This is poem
it is allowed
I give you
explicit permission

to believe whatever you like
can choose to believe
everything
something, nothing,
something and nothing

no big eternal truth
nor any huge perfidious
lie
being told here

no cover ups, whistleblows,
reinterpretations of history
one way

or another creation of mythology,

dabbling in fantasy

letting ideology speak
as if it has every right
to be heard
and
taken seriously.

A DARK IRONY

A DARK IRONY

a dark irony appeared
well, more
than one

filtered up through the floorboards
appeared out of nowhere
fell
from Heaven

but whatever its origin
could not wait
to make mischief
amongst us
do its little work

dividing us from each other
ruthless seperating us
as it
always does

sheep from goats
virtue from
sin

but, above all, those
of the species
with a modicum of
smarts
from
those chosen from
up high
blessed by the sanctity
of all-
knowing power

to take up
their true and rightful place

amongst the
blissfully
ignorant

terminally
stupid

arrayed in such
forbidding shape
(never more solid
more coherent ranks)