Morning and America

It is morning in America

Because that is what comes after

An emptiness of stolen joy

In the night’s darkest hours.

Sown on winds of hope, now reap the whilrlwind 

a coming harvest from seeds of care

that fight and survive in fallow ground

Earth's sweet breath fouled by hatred.

Morning in America

Because the fiber of your being

Is resistant to destruction; though numbed by false sensation,

Will finally recoil from the temptation to wound

the weak ... simply because they are weaker

Morning, and the coming day

Holds promise of greatness

That the thin fabric and bare bones

Made by the sweat and tears of ancestors

Comes alive by the will of their prayers

To fulfill so many wishes for freedom

From the mean lash, and now to this day

It is freedom from a meaner lash of privilege

Morning and America, rising to a song of life

Precious beyond wealth, meaningful beyond measure;

it is the un-purchasable gift of a loving world.

It is Morning, when bleak darkness fades

To the rhythmic rise of an unstoppable tide;

The human spirit is not content to suffer

and rebellions seep through pores, as we

reach for the generosity of the Sun

The light of life has no favorite

leaves no one in shadow, it carries the spark

of creation;  it is we- connected, inseparably

in the image of something far greater, and

by Morning, it calls a day reckoned for justice

in the timeless want of the soul.

Kyiv - a chapter falls

There is fire in the ice,
as if made to still, the gleam
of a more distant sun pales
against the eye's-own anger
and the heart's rush of heat.

There is fire in the icy breath
as if dragons and beasts of fury,
that crowd the mind's theater,
act out upon a glossy stage;
so much rage displayed for consumption
of a greater beast, the global feast
upon sudden misery.

[Democracy has a messy birth]

It is in the waning hours of each day,
the play unwinds; a chapter falls,
and winds of change carry
a stench of burnt tires.

For some it is a whiff of a window
from west into the west, to others a stain
upon a treasure- and Kyiv can bleed,
hot defiant blood, for change is also...
a fire, in the ice. 

Girl's story Sonnet

In dark of morning, quiet' pause within

Time ‘tween days gone and day to be

When I allow the whims that prick my skin

To freely billow breaths of poetry

And etch my words upon a wastrel wind.

The arrogance of a learned path, submits

To a greater wisdom, a worldly dividend

Suspends belief, and justice has no fit.

When we consume the days of youngest ones

An innocence, a time when life's so fertile

For wealth's unholy need a sorrowed harvest done

Little boys into things, and things of little girls.

We harm the yield when we rob the seed

Of time in golden sun, unshadowed by greed


Girl's story is a short story of mine- recent thing- to mark the international Day of Children, November 20, 2013. The theme I have chosen is Child labor.  I set my story in 1916 but as I wrote it, it is still a fact of life today in Asia, and tomorrow in the US because the Right Wing will destroy the middle class ( repeal the minimum wage, right to work laws) and reduce it to the point of putting our children into hard labor ---if we let them. SO DON'T LET THEM.  They do it wherever they can, make $200 sneakers and pay workers $2 a day.

Bankrupt

Risen from sewers
in legions - the corrupt
misled fair minds of A CITY,
now to be claimed by those
who only see the vulture's chance

bankrupt


Gritty City with a tilted halo
your spirit has a gangsta' lean.
Tied by hip to the reckless gas machines, you fueled
much growth; now the world chokes
on the four-wheeled felony: poisoning the air we breathe.

City of such loyal oaths, home and place,
those before came to find, peace and fortune
have blessed us. Kept smiles for so many little-ages.
NOW bankrupt and they sell the precious art.
BANKRUPT in chambers of justice poised
to aid the most unjust taking- democracy

The flower of many ages of sacrifice,
young men went only to return old and war-weary.
They fought and some died there, and there, and there...
died so young-- for Democracy.
Dead for the City they shared with their impatient dreams.
Taken away by whom? Who would dare?
Despoil blood gifts of so many heroes-- so many wonders?

It is a callous time, a time of little men
ruled by petty and corrupt, morally-bankrupt;
men possessed of no ideas
except to please their petty masters.
They are not of Democracy, they have raped it,
violated it with low-hearts of foul little men.

THE CITY where dreams come to be born and reborn
A PLACE tied by spirit to a people who wish
to Love a City

The City transforms, it always has-- it was
a place on the water once, now the water
is remembered on sunny days.
It was a place of sudden freedom for
the shameful days of small callous men
and chains.

We know a City, a place
never short of spirit and hope.
Sadly, never lacking small, indifferent men
who take the bounty others have made
and feed it to a base need for greed.

Yet THE CITY endures, finds sunshine
in the dark clouds, a plume of light to
lift us until dawn; a  candle to keep
a beacon for the Love of those
wh gave us this time and place

A CITY that will once again
prove greater than the puny evil
of small and ruthless men; for
in the City, in a Democracy,
there is a way to remove ...trash.