Poems of the Week

Chili Con Carnage

by Julia Griffin

“Trump lashes out over viral TACO meme.”
ABC News

Quit, little man, your crazy rambling,
Undermining, risking wars:
Everyone’s aware you’re gambling
Safety (ours) for profit (yours),
Adding daily dodgy profit;
Debt’s for all non-billionaires.
Increase benefits? Come off it!
Look beyond your stocks and shares.
Lively times for inside trade;
Attorneys wait. But they’re afraid.

Teaching: crushed with open, hidden,
Or pre-emptive censorship;
Research: finds itself forbidden:
Trounce the Ivies! Wield the whip!
Ignorance makes expertise
Leave its posts, and grabs them too;
Learning shrinks to your decrees
Alone. God help us! (God’s not you.)

Give for all true allies and for
Us some hope of acts not dumb –
A handshake we won’t ask a land for.
Clue us in on what’s to come
About Ukraine! No good, I fear.
Melania—is she still here,
Outsourcing effort every way,
Looting the job (her words come dear),
Escaping work that does not pay?

Spite against any who’ve objected;
Anger at any who oppose;
Lying (an art you’ve long perfected):
Same skill-set, never altered, shows
Again. Meanwhile, the whole world knows:

Trumpists cut healthcare, aid, and schooling:
All can be sick, or dumb, or dead.
Clear as the next Pam Bondi ruling,
Out go our rights. Now watch this spread.