Rags

There are always a constellation of current events,
Though these get interpreted as narratives and myths
That serve the broader agenda of the Heavens,
Those who govern us common people from above.
Like the Lord who owns the Washington Post,
Whose stories fill the pages of the Sacramento Bee
And a singular agenda gets disseminated to a tee.
When I gaze up at the stars
I’d be a lunatic to see myself here at its center,
But this is what propaganda does.
It needs a node like an ego that is nourished from flattering lies.
When I think of the tilt of the earth,
And think of all the wondrous diverse people living there,
I would be a lunatic to think
It should all have a capstone in Washington.
But this is what an Empire does.
And when I think that you would be ostracized for saying such things,
I realize how well
A machine like this is working,
Making a heaven for a handful of folks
By keeping the rest of us in hell.
Is not the main idea keeping the world from changing
The thought that it never will;
As well as the material oppression that makes one want to believe in astrology?



China Muse

I would drink like three bottles of wine a night,
Write a veritable symphony out of a single song
When I first met her, and not much more
Than a year later
I would smoke a lone cigarette out under the moon,
Longing for her on the other side of the world.



Aim Low To Aim High

How delicious is simply water,
When your stores stack sodas to the wretched ceiling,
When your workers aren’t viewed as people who need to use the bathroom,
When properties stand empty because that’s valuable,
When every meal, every purchase, is an extension of the ego,
And not a single commodity ever fills the void,
Which is largely the point.
How badly do you need that cup of sugar,
And when did we stop asking each other for it.
How beautiful is simply life,
How relieving to jump in a pool,
And have a toilet you can go to.
There’s a place you can do it that makes you a criminal.
There’s a place you can do it that makes you civilized.
But don’t do it on my time.
Spend what I transform yours into at less than what you put in on this soda.
And drink it before it gets hot.
You can’t address a crisis without first knowing where the money will come from,
Nothing can be done for its own sake,
Not even saving the world.
How much of the consumer’s anguish is in feeling they don’t enjoy enough,
An unhappy person sits around on a weekend and feels they’re wasting their life,
While other folks in the same affluent nation don’t have potable water,
And a pointless person writes a poem about it.
How much is it the ego that actually separates us,
Like the ritual of exchanging digits for what I need to survive?
How much is it this identity you’ve foisted on me
That makes the recognition of one human being to another
Totally obscure?
There’s a heatwave,
I’m simply sitting around
But at least I can take cold showers,
I can drink a glass of water.
To think there was one day we all shared things with each other,
To think it’s possible to at least get through the day,
Let alone attain to the most basic level of socialism.
There is something you will never enjoy,
That is nonetheless worth aiming at it
Existing one day in such profusion
It was as ubiquitous as the sea.