Alex Steelsmith

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The Politician’s Confession

Disclaimer: Whereas the following lines merely record verbatim a monologue overheard in close proximity to a confessional booth, all efforts to the contrary notwithstanding, the transcriber henceforth bears no responsibility whatsoever for any ungrammatical uses of words, awkward neologisms, or identical rhymes included hereinbelow.

Bless me, Father, I have sinned.
For years, wherever I’ve meandered,
puffing like a bag of wind,
I’ve sullied, slurred, disparaged, slandered,
smeared and smirked, and smirched and grinned;
I’ve bashed, misogynized, misandered,
hurled invective right on script,
and doubled down, and double-slandered,
double-crossed, and double-dipped;
I’ve flaunted every double standard,
double-faked, and flopped and flipped;
I’ve tripled down, and triple-slandered,
rigged the system, falsified,
manipulated, gerrymandered,
obfuscated, leaked, and lied;
I’ve taken payoffs, groveled, pandered,
cooked the books, concealed, denied,
quadrupled down, quadruple-pandered,
ratted, weaseled, wheeled and dealed;
I’ve slithered, snaked, and salamandered,
wormed and squirmed, and slimed and eeled;
I’ve twisted, hyped, and propagandered,
ducked and chickened, groused and squealed;
I’ve bloviated, self-aggrandered,
cocked and crowed, and just for fun,
I’ve also frequently philandered,
feigned remorse for everyone
when caught, and promptly re-philandered.
Pardon me, but all I’ve done
is commonplace, and fairly standard.

A writer and fine artist, Alex Steelsmith has coauthored three nonfiction books and numerous articles for various publications, including USA Today. In addition to Light, Alex’s poems have appeared in The Spectator, The Washington Post, The Lyric, Snakeskin, Lighten Up Online, Parody, and other venues. His artwork has been shown in many museums and galleries, and is in the Smithsonian’s permanent collection.