No longer sets her bow in huge waves rushing on

This verse was inspired by grandson Mikey when as a small boy he romped on top of the windlass in the bow of HMS ‘Queen Mary’, moored in Long Beach, CA since 1967. Of course ‘sic transit gloria mundi’ ship wise, while Mikey is still in his prime as a young man.

On polished upper decks: splendor & light
a display of power, riches & fame
while in the ship’s belly toiled crew out of sight
Times past like today, remaining the same

In her day the flagship of empire
enterprise, industry & might
albeit were it soon to expire
based more on arrogance than right

Many a storm howled around the crew in the con
No longer sets her bow in huge waves rushing on:

The windlass a stage for a toddler’s romp
as parents watch by gleaming gunnels
Without fail shall fade circumstance & pomp.
The ship a play field with three funnels

Now an amusement park in a disparate age
the ‘Queen Mary’ languishes moored in a zoo’s cage

+)
-funnel = smokestack, especially on a steamship
-gunnels = the upper edge of a ship’s side
-the ‘Queen Mary’ held the ‘Blue Ribbon’ speed record across the Atlantic after averaging 31 knots in 1938, between New York and Southampton

Fresh from ‘successes’ elsewhere, up next: China!

Beltway stuck lascivious
in politics insidious
Flimsy pretexts devious
brings on aggression hideous

Elated by advanced hardware
men in power act like boys
Those ‘warriors of the armchair’
want power, ribbons & toys

Safely back home they adore war
martially heroic lore
Ordering troops to roar & gore
to settle a phantom score:

Merciless U.S. guns
destroyed poor Iraq
Couldn’t even sweep the crumbs
left from this ‘cake walk’

While the U.S. been unable to defeat
‘medieval’ Taliban, al-Qaeda bands
North Koreans, Cubans or Vietnamese
‘enemies’ in the world’s modest back lands

Now foments a new Cold War with the Kremlin
such as in Ukraine by regime change coup
but Donetsk & Crimea, far from crumbling
stands up to Kiev’s neo-Nazi hue

Thus fresh from ’successes’ up next:
Pivoting with mindless ease
supercilious muscles flexed:
Trying bully the Chinese!

Droning on about its ‘finest hour’
while fading fast its sense & power

+)
-the Beltway = the U.S. power elite
-phantom score = Contrary to e.g. John Quincy Adams’ foreign policy aspirations of 1821:
“But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.
The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force. She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit.”

 

Riding the ‘Coast Starlight’ at night

Drawn owlish train whistles
in plaintive shrillness
each piercingly chisels
through nightly stillness

Through windows in blurry caprice
darkly flash by power poles
Swaying coach cradling us in peace
lounging bodies, stirred up souls

Thunders through crossings’ clangs
of collapsing crescendo
fading as also-rangs
until mere innuendo

Through mountains, along banks
rolls the Coast Starlight
Each wheel set timely clanks
in silent moonlight

+)
-also-rang = rang: past tense of ring; from ‘also-ran’
-Coast Starlight = the Amtrak train between Seattle and Los Angeles

Hey, Thucydides, that was then. This is now and how!

“Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men most.”
-Thucydides (c.460 B.C.– c.400 B.C.)

If restraint implies ‘voluntary’ restraint would we these days recognize something so over the top quaint?

Yes, in Antiquity
but regarded now
as mere obliquity
Here is why & how:

Today’s absence of restraint
sustains mindless shopping
above all for more war paint
unjust wars not stopping

Fans fiery fire
absent qualms
by our Empire
dropping bombs

While voices of restraint
raised rarely, echo faint

On watching the 2016 ‘debates’

Clinton & Kaine, Trump & Pence

in stale slogans-slinging babble
devoid of much style or sense
against us the struggling rabble

Here’s their campaign memoranda
First: Stoke our fear, greed & hopes
like in all good propaganda
aimed at us gullible dopes

Then: “In rightful belligerence
ride with us, shiny White Knights!
In utter sweet deliverance
“Reclaim our very birthrights!”

They keep us riled & incensed
in willful ignorance
so that we’re voting against
our own true interests

By holding up shiny Redux
they’re keeping us always in flux!

Mirage creators, slick myth narrators

In these so called ‘debates’
we’re fed thin gruel
while opens all floodgates
to base & cruel

Those scripted ‘debaters’:
Mirage creators
in-the-wings dictators
slick myth narrators

Discombobulated
populace fretful
seen our hopes deflated
by priors fateful

Even so we keep up our drool
the sure fate of the hapless fool!

 

Yet another bait & switch

The ‘One Nation Exceptional’
now resoundingly unmasked
while ‘Greatness’ just conceptional
still being pitched unabashed:

Ready for another bait & switch?
He’s prickly, prone to toddler fits
This time around plays in mega kitsch
short on manners, knowledge & wits

Howls in a hurricane of glitz
klutzy & shallow clamor
disingenuous repeat fits
A narcissistic scammer

A vainglorious con artist
from reality unhitched
Voters not informed or smartest
being too easily sales pitched!

Mindless consumer minions
though can’t be bothered with facts
entitled to their opinions
as propaganda distracts:

whether in The Beltway or backwoods
sadly they buy a sick bill of goods

+)
-The Beltway = the Washington, DC power elite
-One Nation Exceptional:
“The United States has always been corrupt, savage and brutal. It has always been wildly dysfunctional and hypocritical. But now, thanks to a president-elect who is loudly ignorant and utterly devoid of impulse control the mask is off. The horrible truth about the United States can no longer be denied. Trump epitomizes truth in advertising. We’re a nasty, crappy country. President Trump suits us fine.” – Ted Rall

Yeah but, I’m really not sure what you mean?

Planet privatization
while polar caps melting
Gobbling globalization
while hurricanes pelting

Economic disparity
in consumptive temerity
Political polarity
for us people austerity

Perpetually prodigious predation
leaving victims without restitution
Usurious financialization
where’s its societal contribution?

Fades now erstwhile solidarity
in rear mirror’s celerity
with jaded familiarity
and counterfeit sincerity

“Yeah but, I’m really not sure what you mean
as been importantly tied up on my screen?”