HAZED AND DIFFUSED

by Rémy Dambron

As the sound of our neighbor’s lawn 

mower pierces the silence of the hellish 
landscape forming just past our bedroom 
window my wife and I exchange mirroring 
glances of hostile befuddlement 
maddened by this man’s unfathomable 
indifference to the bewilderment of 
smoke flowing freely into his eyes 
and down deep into his lungs despite 
wearing a confident smile as he strolls 
absentmindedly through his yard 
pushing that obnoxious gas powered 
machine to shorten the small strip of 
parched grass that faces our still baffled 
faces now visibly posing the inevitable question 
what in the actual fuck is happening? 
We continue to watch in shock as I frantically 
google the news desperate to confirm that 
yes in fact there are wildfires blazing at 
our city’s doorstep in addition to riots and 
shootings and protests and looting and tagging 
and militias immersed in science refuting and 
that this conundrum of a man tending to his plot 
amidst the infiltrating remains floating in from 
burning homes incinerated cars perished 
businesses lost livelihoods vanishing forests 
and melted memories isn’t just symptomatic 
of some feverish dream or drug-induced vision 
or mystical illusion or some grave delusion but 
that our mutual astonishment is actual credible 
physical proof of the resilience of our little remaining 
sanity.

Rémy Dambron is an activist, environmentalist, and author based out of Portland, Oregon. His work has appeared in What Rough Beast, Writer's Resist, Poets Reading the News, and TheNewVerse.News, focusing largely on denouncing political corruption and advocating for social justice. Without the love and support of his wife Susan, he would not be the writer he is today.  

PREPPING FOR DOOMSDAY

by Tom Karlson

Michigan closed down its capitol in Lansing on Thursday and canceled its legislative session rather than face the possibility of an armed protest and death threats against Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer. The gathering, meant to advocate opening the state for business despite the coronavirus pandemic, followed one April 30 that resulted in pictures of protesters clad in military-style gear and carrying long guns crowding the statehouse. They confronted police and taunted lawmakers. —Bloomberg, May 14, 2020

they are not wearing brown shirts
they can’t sing Deutschland Uber Alles
these protesters are tattooed white nationalists
cameo clad, heavily armed,
red hatted, tattooed, with confederate flag and swastika
they are dyed in the wool homegrown
Nazi  Motherfuckers

crazed defenders of the second amendment
president t***p tweets open up America,
protect the constitution
these are good people
these are his people

protected by Barr’s boys
the thugs are on the move
ordered and paid to liberate
Michigan, Ohio, Virginia, Kentucky
they come to boogaloo (armed insurrection)
not native or black or brown
these pale thugs have carte blanche
from the loyal men in blue

BC (before covid)
45 and his boys knew
high stock market and
low employment equal
certain reelection

AC (after covid)
the equation is changed
and the impeached one
the quinine loving
fact fucker
does nothing for 8 weeks
for thousands a early death

and now we have
the orange domed leader
press briefing rallies
urging his doomsday prepping,
white privileged militia goons
to open up
and make america great again


Tom Karlson’s information: My poetry is political / my poetry is about stuff I can see / smell feel hear / read about / stuff from history, / natural history / my history / an outcry, protest / justice, injustice / of contradictions / and musings / sounds and goddesses / moving around objective / reality toward life / a better world is coming