by Frank Sloan
warm, muggy night.
Todd Tihart safely home in bed.
all his aides and analysts and speech writers
resting comfortably on their thick mattresses
and the cost of health insurance for working people
zooming crazily like a Wile E. Coyote rocket.
the wife and I can’t sleep.
the walls of their new economy close in on us.
we find it hard to breathe in peace.
all the congressmen, home in their bed dreaming of their generous pensions,
either don’t see our don’t care about the trap they set for us.
we catch the wail of an ambulance slashing through the night.
some poor soul crashed on the highway and headed for bankruptcy, if he isn’t dead.
some poor slob
on his way home from a second job at the paint factory,
slaving his health away
for his four kids and a tankful of gas and a worn out mattress.
Frank Sloan lives and writes in a small shack near the heart of the empire. Despite all evidence to the contrary, he believes it’s a heart that beats worth rescuing.