FROM ONE BOOMER
“Politics is a vexation of the spirit.” – Doug Draime
It’s not a problem for me,
this old man is on board.
I’ll gladly step aside and
let you young folks take over –
I’ve grown tired of the fighting
and you couldn’t do any worse.
Looking back I can tell you that
those of us who could see what
was happening at the time
were helplessly outnumbered
by the greed and self-centered fear
of those standing on the sidelines.
The exploited, cultivated ignorance,
of the no-longer-silent majority.
Those who rose to power with the
Reagan Revolution, out of the
ashes of Nixon’s resignation and
unforgivable pardon, who defeated
our hope for a future of peace,
for a future of consciousness,
for the future of the earth itself.
We were overwhelmed by endless
waves of insatiable consumerism,
fast food, and increasingly complex,
addictive social media all intended
to spread the illusion of choice,
to keep us all contented and docile.
Any voice of reason which dared
to speak the truth was trivialized.
We were painted as crazy hippies
babbling out of a marijuana haze,
totally out of touch with reality.
When, instead, we were trying to
alert people to the reality denied by
the rich and powerful who hold the
means of production with the vast
expanse of media at their command.
These are the men who harvest the bounty
of the earth to the point of exhaustion,
every bit of it fed to them by the
labor of those they beguile,
those who cheered them on,
who still cheer them on –
cattle to the abattoir, wincing
from electric prods, but defending
their butchers all the way to the
chopping block and the chipper.
So go right ahead Millennials,
generations X & Z, dismiss
me if you must, but make sure
you have a plan in place. Show
us how it should have been done.
We’re waiting, listening, watching -
still ready to move into action
once you’ve figured out
how to topple the massive
Moloch of capitalism, moving,
unwavering, toward its
apotheosis in fascism.
It’s up to you to discover
what needs to happen
to stop all this madness,
to get solutions rolled out.
Hope, if it remains,
abides in you.
Do not let me or my kind
hold you back.
--M.J. Arcangelini
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