YOU NEED TO CALM DOWN

by Frank De Canio

This video by Taylor Swift won the Video for Good and Video of the Year awards at Monday’s MTV Video Music Awards. In her acceptance speech, Swift commended VMA voters for supporting the video’s message of LGBTQ equality and once again brought attention to her petition for the Equality Act, noting that it now has over 500,000 signatures “which is five times the amount that it would need to warrant a response from the White House,” she said, checking her imaginary watch to indicate she’s still waiting.

Just as a quarry’s brash response
brings to the fore, one laid to waste,
a stance conveying nonchalance
implies its source has been outfaced.
They’re adversaries Taylor Swift
can handle with good-naturedly
aplomb. She doesn’t let them rift
her measured sensibility.
Nor does she blithely shake them off
with just a sisterly rebuke.
For less Patrón than Molotov
cocktail she just as well would duke
it out when trolls step on her gown,
were she not bent on calming down.


Frank De Canio was born & bred in New Jersey, works in New York. He love theater and music of all kinds, from Bach to Amy Winehouse. He hosts a Cafe Philo discussing philosophical issues in lower Manhattan.

GOD WINS

by Frank De Canio

with the Godwin family whose father was murdered

God wins, indeed, with devotees like these
who show the hard way to a nobler realm
of love. No bending, supplicating knees
petitioning the world to overwhelm
the murderer of their beloved Dad.
Benevolence reigns godlike in their hearts
to help them walk beneath the cross they’ve had
to bear. No smug indulgence that imparts
a measured justice for their neighbor’s loss,
while their own griefs are fueled with kindling rage.
Instead, they selflessly pursue a course
that imitates the God-anointed sage
who, forced to drink death’s vinegary gall,
could still afford forgiveness for us all.


Born & bred in New Jersey, Frank De Canio works in New York. Shakespeare is his consolation, writing his hobby. He likes Dylan Thomas, Keats, Wallace Stevens, Frost, Ginsburg, and Sylvia Plath as poets.

THE JOYS OF SUMMER

by Frank De Canio




For once a year a level playing field
obtains for millions of us baseball fans.
No legislation works like bats men wield
for getting us to join disparate hands
in making sure the same ground work is done
that candidates are loath to do. One ump
enforces rules until the game is won.
Nor is there fear the losing team can trump
the outcome. Players get to base on balls
that otherwise are wanting in some pay
to play receivers heeding donor’s calls,
instead of those constituents convey.
And universal suffrage simply means
that all have access to their tv screens.


Born & bred in New Jersey, Frank De Canio works in New York. He loves music from Bach to Dory Previn, Amy Beach to Amy Winehouse, World Music, Latin, opera. Shakespeare is his consolation, writing his hobby. He likes Dylan Thomas, Keats, Wallace Stevens, Frost, Ginsburg, and Sylvia Plath as poets.

MIGRANT

by Frank De Canio





Duress held captive by her will,
she held him thrashing in a boat
then waded through the waves and chill
that kept his hardened heart afloat.
She then assayed the Rio Grande,
less émigré in sore distress
than athlete in a marathon.
Her mettle hammered out US
of A above the custom house
across the line from Mexico.
Nor would the trials still pending douse
the girl’s triumphant afterglow
at having weathered storm and stress.
A tough as leather pioneer,
she trumpeted resourcefulness
to claim her valor’s broad frontier.

Born & bred in New Jersey, Frank De Canio works in New York. Shakespeare is his consolation, writing his hobby.