Again the man said he’d just lost his job.
Again he said he lost his girlfriend.
He’d just lost his way.
Again the man was lost yet
said it was a free country.
The man was lost in a free country and
again he said in this free country
he’d lost everything,
everything that gave him any power,
any purpose,
— except his guns.
He said in this free country the man with guns
had the power, was in power.
The gun was all-powerful in this country and
again the man said he’d be damned
if he’d give up this country
to low-life peons,
said he’d go out of his way to shoot
all good-for-nothing outsiders
with their brown, black or yellow skin,
illegals who didn’t look like him.
Again he said it was a free country
and he was free to shoot riffraff
whether he looked in their faces first
or just aimed straight ahead or
to the left or the right.
Again the man said guns gave men power.
In this free country the man with guns
was in charge.
Again he said he was in charge.
In charge of the main event,
the grand slam, the squeeze play,
the final solution in his free country and
he and his guns were center stage
and in charge.
In charge of life and death
but mostly death.
Again the man with guns shouted “Charge”
and shot straight ahead and
to the right and the left.
And again death,
death again,
someplace, someday,
anywhere, at any moment,
in our country,
in this free country,
guns and death again
and again and
again.
Editor's Note: President Trump met in the Oval Office on Friday with Wayne LaPierre, the chief executive of the National Rifle Association, and discussed prospective gun legislation and whether the N.R.A. could provide support for the president as he faces impeachment and a more difficult re-election campaign, according to two people familiar with the meeting. —The New York Times, September 27, 2019
Lenny Lianne is the author of four full-length books of poetry. Her poems have appeared in Rattle, Poet Lore, Third Wednesday, Southern Poetry Review and other journals and anthologies. She holds a MFA from George Mason University. She's taught poetry workshops on both coasts. Lenny and her husband live in Peoria, Arizona.