WHAT TO DO SHANTY

WHAT TO DO WITH A DRUNKEN
NATION SHANTY  (EARLY
IN THE MORNING)?

Oh America!
America!

after those Lego
diss videos
          (while we are about
it give that what
to do with
a drunken Hegseth
one a
frigging Oscar)

you are going to
need
to come up
with something
truly blockbuster, titanic,
brilliantly epic

find your
new Lincoln, Roosevelt, Walt
Whitman, Henry
James, William Faulkner,
Kennedy,
Stanley Kubrick, Scott Fitzgerald,
         Sylvia Plath  George Carlin

to put
     forward your
counter argument, redress
the balance
    stop the entire world
killing
     themselves with laughter

upping  your smarts
to compete
with such
       outrageous wit, pure
satirical talent

          grow such artistic,
intellectual, literary,
political luminaries —

which
makes it a pity you
slashed education, downgraded
critical intelligence,
stripped your
universities to purchase
another trillion
dollars worth
of essential weapons

rather
    plant for a future
a different path
entirely

that one
    you always refused
to take

now your
only survival