Home of the Blues Drowns in Bureaucracy
Home of the Blues Drowns in Bureaucracy
By Genevieve Cora Fraser
He
strutted onto the stage
The military might
To the
rescue too late
To save so many
Who clung to
life
In a toxic stew
Burning images
Of our own
making
He waited for the right
Moment to release
His help so limp
In response to the horror
Waited
waited waited
The security of the homeland
At stake
too late
Roadblocks placed
In the path of
would-be
Rescuers held-up
Attempts
To
assist
Resisted
100s of thousands
Abandoned
Poor
Black
Elderly
Handicapped
Left to die
Drowning in filth
Dehydrated
Starved broiling
In the heat
He refused offers
Needing to
contemplate
The need that was lapping
At the nations
doorstep
Flooding the airwaves
Breaking the sound
barrier
With their screams
60 nations united
To
help taken under
Advisement to be decided
After the
havoc of babies
Cries grow dim die
The elderly,
fragile, sick
Expire
In places so remote
From
basic humanity
A civilization collapsed
By immoral
leadership
His ego so massive
It took a week
To
arrive
For the photo-op
The monumental
Moment
flanked by reporters
He unleashed the military
might
Fresh from assault
Reeking of death in
Iraq
In Afghanistan in Secret
Locations
Killing for oil
World control
Whoever
Is not
with us
Is poor Black
Brown they
Do not
compute
In the cost-benefit
Ratio White is the
divide
The gold standard
Valued the Others
To be
governed
By brute force
Here and abroad
He finally
arrived
The vain-glorious commander
With his
troops
M16s raised for control
As corpses cried
Out
in ghastly
Formations
Rotting
In the High
Noon
Of America
ENDS