America's New Song
(a response to Walt Whitman's "I Hear America Singing")
As I listen to America’s new song, stray ideas catch my attention,
Crows greet the day with songs left over from the chilly night before,
Shouts of ‘White Power’ fill the atmosphere of American military camps,
Puppets chanting in cadence, songs of conformity,
The robed men singing the innocent into the corner of their prison cells
to rot with the guilty,
The hum of gasoline guzzling trucks as they rumble down the street,
Standing in the doorway of an exorbitant church I hear the hymn
of the avaricious catechist as he greedily eyes the silvery glint
of the
collection plate,
A song of sirens breaks the silence of an evening of familiar conversation,
The melody of a broken child becomes it’s desolate destination,
A man armed with a briefcase whistles as he skips past a man disarmed by indifference.
