Is this the brand of greatness we desire
Will all this madness make us great again
Dividing hearts and setting lives afire
And separating kids from parents when
It’s hard to find a job and wages slide
While markets are more fragile than before
It doesn’t matter what we claim beside
The daily plight of citizens galore
We’ve fractured every friendship we held dear
And stepped on wounds by elevating tyrants
We’ve seen this all before but now it’s clear
The dream autocracy has broken silence
It doesn’t matter much how great we’ll be
Once we have slaughtered our humanity
Sonnet
On My Attempt to Open a Bottle of Chocolate Milk
This came about while watching my son as we waited at the airport a couple days ago.
My life is like this chocolate milk delight
So complicated just to open up
The seal won’t break: the cap is screwed on tight
I wish they served it in a paper cup
I ask my dad to help but he says no
So here I am determined and committed
To part this bottle from its cap and so
I carefully examine how it’s fitted
I slide a nail into where seal may give
It does and I repeat this little move
Till seal descends into a plastic cliff
My digits work a counterclockwise groove
Till cap comes loose at last – now gentle sips
That eulogize this cocoa off my lips
On Humility
The circle of humility is small
And only those who cannot see it, enter,
For such an entry makes the humble fall
Into a spot where circle is as center.
You cannot then become it overnight,
Or over weeks, or even over months
Like mirror that reflects a mirror sight
And on, till all reflections come at once.
To mock and shun the virtue is a vice;
To give it up an even greater flaw;
Embrace it till you make it your device
And practice like you want to make it law.
We’ll be upon this journey till we see
There is no circle of humility.
First Light Musings
Awakening to sounds of foremost light
I feel the stories tear into my soul
Of someplace where the sun fell on the night
To vaporize a family once whole.
I see their faces turned up to the sky
And wonder if they ever wore a smile,
Or had they even watched another die
Yet never thinking they would. All the while
The images of death and grieving drain
The little melatonin left in me
Until these deals of Prime Day turn my brain
Away from where my heart would rather be.
If only there were great discounts for peace,
We’d know the real meaning of increase.
It’s Hard To Be A Muslim
It’s hard to be a Muslim in these times
When random border checks have gotten cold
With camps and waterboarding on our minds
And neo-nazi haters walking bold
Like foreigners in lands we hold our own
We’re dust on maps dividing us apart
Unfounded fears turning hearts to stone
Impelling policy bereft of heart
We hear the names of prophets tossed in vain
By voices on the left and on the right
But can’t submit our intellect to gain
Admission to a Garden wrought from Light
It’s hard to be a Muslim till we see
That Muslim is just all we need to be
Repartee
The words are formed and primed to do their dance
Upon the bones of honor in disgrace
You’ve strung your bow of tongue, awaiting chance
To send that verbal arrow nocked in place.
But then, just as you are about to fire
There falls a slowing hand upon your bow
Eliding tension for a reason higher
Than all the reasons you could ever know.
The arrow is dismantled word by word,
Replaced by disposition quite reversed:
An arsenal of patience undeterred
By thoughts seducing you to be your worst.
It is an act of courage to withhold
A poisoned arrow, be it cast in gold.
What I Said
So here I am, I’ve found that slice of time
When I said what I said; I freeze it dry
And step toward its body laced with crime
To analyze the what, how, when and why.
It looks quite innocent from where I am,
A figure cloaked in camphor-scented lies,
So I get closer till the fog of glamor
Lifts, revealing all my tongue devised.
Its face glows bright, a blinding flaring red,
Its hands are raised, upturned without a care,
I look for smile but find a smirk instead,
And cringe to see the maggots in its hair.
I let time roll to crush its nasty head
And plan apologies for what I said.
To The Trump Transition Team, With Love
Remember always: they’ll be watching you,
So watch yourself and be a bit afraid;
Injustice has a way of falling through
And dragging with it all who give it aid.
So think before you act if think you can;
It is a way to take a matter through
The stages of a formidable plan
And most importantly, do think of you.
For once a plan is executed, know
The livelihoods and lives that it enslaves
All come together as a hammer’s blow
On tyrant bodies writhing in their graves.
The angels watching, waiting, never tire
To drag the hands of tyrants into fire.
On Hope
You cannot hope to be one free of pain
While pain is all around you and within
Where heart repeats perpetual refrain
To punctuate the story you are in.
But let your hope lay down its weary head
Upon the breast of prayer wont to rise
On wings of love sincere when they’re spread
To meet the wind. With tear-moistened eyes,
Go swim around that ever-fading star
Of life, and in your faithful orbit stay
That in the darkness whence you seem afar
You rise and fall, and rise to show the way.
It only bodes despair when you have lost
The solemn will to hope at any cost.
Noyz
We’ve fled the city with its memories
Of breaths and names, and instead left behind
Our fickle footsteps lost to every breeze
And found again beneath the weight of mind.
I teeter on a slippy edge of time
As teenage chatter drowns the car I’m in
In laughter that must constitute a crime
When fused with snores designed to waken Jinn.
There is no thinking I could ever do
While in this otherwise efficient train,
No headphones block the sounds I play unto
My mind which never falters to retain
The garbage that once heard stays on repeat
Until I’ve gotten off this blasted seat.