In my last post I talked about Robert DeNiro’s apt description of the mind of a writer. One of the things I’ve always wondered is why there aren’t more openly conservative poets and writers. I have a few thoughts of my own, but I’d like to hear what you have to think.
I’ve shared a poem or two over the course of this blog, but I don’t think I’ve ever posted one that really makes a political statement. If you want a peak into my mind as a 21 year old kid, and the reaction I had after exiting the military and entering the college classroom, here it is. My writing has improved since then (I’m 34, so I would hope so!), but I don’t mind giving you a glimpse of my younger self.
In Defense of Dead Presidents and the American Way of Life.
Bees make beehives and we make buildings
Don’t lament the ingenuity within this sleek machine I’m driving;
It’s an extension of our being
Natural, like honeycomb or busy bees consumed by some activity
To better their day-by-day existence.
Let’s return to the lush green-wooded yesteryear
Where tribal chants and chieftain rants
Were aspects of everyday living.
Or better yet let’s not,
Intertribal rape and head lice were never that appealing.
American Empire, or so they say
Rapes third world resources from exploited labor—
Fire those lads lined up and ready to work long hours
Making meager earnings three times their peers!
Let’s pull out and prop up tin pot despots with aid that will never get there.
Curses! Western Civilization
With your claims of moral superiority
Ah yes, I’m aware of your duplicity—
Behind those technological wonder kids and wonder cures
Churned out from rule-of-law freedom spawn is something sinister I’m sure.
Back home things are horrid
The burger and fry flippers scream foul
Ten, Twenty, why not Thirty!
Let’s hike that minimum wage stand back and see what happens
Never mind the economics.
What’s wrong with the summertime soldier and sunshine patriot?
Let’s redefine patriotism to include
Malcontents and misfits and anti-war mentalities
Dead set on peace at any cost
Although rooms for rape, rooms for torture, rooms for worse are tricky.
I had been ill for quite some time—
Green tea tasted great but did little to quell my disease.
I asked my son to pray for me, but his principal said no.
Dejected, I turned to God and in a dream
He told me to see a doctor—who knew.
America, you make me sick
What with your so-called religious freedom, I’m persecuted at every turn.
I informed my priest I was heading to Saudi Arabia.
I would’ve went too! (if it were legal)
Christians can’t be citizens.
Mom and Dad say it’s not healthy
To be so wry, so angry, all the time.
The soul, like worn copper pennies.
It’s hard, I tell them, when notable poets and award winning scholars
Invent ways to trash Abe Lincoln.
To my wife
Douglas Ernst Blog 