by Michel Steven Krug
Call back after call back.
Each reel like a test flight
Because my peers look at
My prior roles like an IMDB,
(Although I call it DIMB)
Because the country as a whole
Won’t embrace me,
Though I’ve acted out every role
To perfection. So here I am now,
The 14th, 15th, who knows how
Many rounds, still standing, but my smile
Muscles so fatigued. I need a drink. But
Craft service won’t serve on the House floor
Anymore, the way they did, I’m sure,
When Frederick H. Gillett could get
All the recesses and bourbon he needed
To convince the zealots that the Roaring 20s
Would only prevail under his leadership,
And lead to unrivaled economic prosperity.
And what about Speaker William Pennington?
He maintained his 1859 principled approach to
State’s rights, bringing the Country to
Brinksmanship, where it belongs again, so
Who, I ask, is the real reformer?
Fine, I will pledge to insurrect.
I will pledge to abandon rules.
I will pledge to renege.
I can’t be Hakeem
I can’t alliterate
I can’t inspire, but
I must be your next leader. Don’t pull the plug,
Please don’t, surely, we can strike
A deal for more donations, another deal, for G*d’s sake.
Michel Steven Krug is a Minneapolis poet, fiction writer, former print journalist from the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars and he litigates. His poems have appeared in Whistling Shade, St. Paul Almanac, Liquid Imagination, Blue Mountain Review, Jerry Jazz, Portside, The New Verse News, JMWW, Cagibi, Silver Blade, Crack the Spine, Dash, Mikrokosmos, North Dakota Quarterly, Eclectica, Writers Resist, Sheepshead, Mizmor Anthology, Poets Reading the News, Ginosko, Door Is A Jar, Raven's Perch, Main Street Rag, and Brooklyn Review.