for Joe & Tommy


America keeps on slippin’, slippin’ into

          the future

                      True or False

(Chomsky—I paraphrase

        ‘I’m optimistic

     With all due respect,

       no reason for it (that

    (as those might concur who’ve walked away,

             holding their head under their arm

...

America, crossroads of global trade

You believe that?
Out of Dogpatch?

Outsourcing what
McCain says
won’t be replaced

So much for a beloved
Appalachia

‘Better red than dead
ma daddy allays said

I want my voice
to list these sins

so I’ll always be
remembered

Remember him?
Huh?

Uniquely
American response

to everything

The bizness of America is….

‘n I’m gonna cut
that mountain down to size

of ma ‘lil….

“Fry me a river
I’ve fried a river over you

and over and over;
the disc’s stuck

That’s a rap for you

Fluoride has removed
the critical faculty
(or somethin’

‘n nuthin’ has replaced larning

(We’ll all be lighting our
Havanas w/ hunerts
(worth about a nickle

But, enough of the small talk;
How’s Britney

Britannia rules the waves

2 The Weather Report

“Heck, we were jes cumin’ over
the bridge
when out of nowheres thar’s this twister

deen’t see it cumin’ t’all

The streams are rainbow hued
for the radio heads

‘n we’re, all of us, gonna
git together under the
Democrat’s social umbrella,
‘n break bread, ‘n socialize,
‘n alsmost have health insurance,
‘n alsmost have a livin’ wage,
a sufficient social net
‘t catch us when we fall
on our heads

‘Fall on your sword, pilgrim

It’s almost unspeakable folly

:up from my place
there’s an old, open pit
lead mine
which scar will be
on the mountain
almost an eternity

and that was just a handful of
people’s diabolical conception

and it still poisons the
surrounding area

The EPA was up there
two or three years ago
still trying to clean up
after it

But nothing lasts forever

:as the universe is ever expanding,
eventually even God will self-destruct
as the last proton and neutrino are pulled
apart
;space also ceases to exist
as there is no longer anything
to define it

Truly, goodbye to all that
(this, c.13 billion a.d.
,give or take

What were you expecting?

I know,
but it’s folly

One just thinks “mountain top removal

God’ll show them
true removal

3 Towards a new paradigm

If you are a good boy/girl
and, loved as you are by
the Creator as His only
conscious creation
(over a little time

,such a divine, benign anthropomorphic
existence bestowed on him
if for no better reason
than as the lst Cause

,and leave only a slight footprint
through your life’s travels
nor countenance your industry
belching heedlessly
into the atmosphere

it is possible to have a
one-to-one relationship with Him—
in that long tradition of our species

,and your life’s consolation
will [have to] be in trying to do good—
or not
as it, in any case, all ends too soon

and, as sd, finally
all of it
,not excluding Mr G