Political / Social Poems (810)

Many years ago, when I was still a young psychotherapist/hypnotherapist, I worked with a teacher whose heart was broken by her itinerant lover…,
She was a young and beautiful woman,
And, as she lay there on the couch, one day,
Tears softly adorning her face,
My heart went out to her…,
To my great joy, we had a major breakthrough that afternoon after several months of therapy,
Notice, I said we, for, therapy is always a collaborative effort,
One side alone, can never honestly take credit,
As the therapist, you reach out across the proverbial misery-river-Styx,
And you hope against hope, especially when you’re young and inexperienced as I was,
That your proffered hand will be accepted,
And that the healing will begin…,
Fortuitously for me, my extended hand was accepted and grasped, and the healing began…,
The joy I felt in my heart when she called me a few hours later to tell me how she was floating on ‘cloud nine’, cannot be measured or described…


Right this minute, a couple of decades later, I’m still ‘plying-my-trade’,
This time on my own wounded psyche,
I too, feel on ‘cloud-nine’, after a very soothing self-hypnosis session where I try to become one with light,
Aaahhh…, what a feeling…,
What bliss…,
I thought by sharing it with my friends on this corner, I may hang onto this nirvana a little longer,
Wishing you all whatever elixir you’re personally seeking my fellow-poets…,
Till next time…

Moody's in the mood to short sell
Congress's word to someday pay
sounds harsh but might be as well
political kids spoilin' just to play

forget the lunch, can't break-the-fast
for some, free is freedom to turn away
ignore basic facts, easier to lambaste
opponents and leave tomorrow in disarray

empty rhetoric is taxing my patience
'stead of taxing our monied ability
planking on opinion without complaisance
cliff leap before compromise with civility

chaotic lurching of well-oiled-machine
still with fits and spurts it grinds on
how democracy runs, is anything but clean
gentlemen-statesmen's days are long gone

if ever there were, a whole other debate
with contemplative points to be sure
the pros and cons can't always equate
political work is anything but demure

© agoodguy2have 2011-07-14

Beneath the tree the presents spread
A wondrous sight to see
The boxes bright with ribbons tied
And lights upon the tree

And yet the boy he sat so sad
For missing was his present
Peace for the world was all he asked
Why could that not be given

given all of the pertinent facts
I wonder why we grind the axe

to prove our point of pointed dismay
that things should be the other way

and furthermore we pointedly assume
no change of course will spell out doom

to all we value and hold so dearly
the end of the world we know, or nearly

that axe to grind so smooth and keen
can slice out dissent to intervene

and change our differing conversations
to gulfs of animosity and altercations

so you'd better shape up and repent
see my wisdom and give your consent

to change it 'round to another leaning
instead of finding ways of demeaning

not my point, or my position, but me
and interrogate me with a third degree

as if my merely saying to you "ok, ok"
would be sufficient to have your own way

in the course of humanity's day-to-day
any view is from point-of-view, my way

so make sure before you grind your axe
against my thoughts, my ideas, my facts

that tree you want to cut down to size
might just be the log within your eyes

© agoodguy2have 2011-07-19

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

Your nose is not right, it screamed at me
Too big, too fat, too long
I have to get this fixed right now
Go under the surgeon's knife
My nose is fixed, it is just right
The doctors they assured me

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

Cheeks too high, too prominent
My face they did not match
We can fix and alter that
To make your face appealing
Without a thought it's back I go
To let them do the procedure

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

My lips too thin, I look quite mean
They say these make bad lovers
Easy to fix, the doctors say
We'll just squirt in some collagen
Luscious lips you soon will have
The answer to a girl's prayers

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

My chin too wide, too masculine
It makes me look ridiculous
A chin I need that's feminine
So elegant, dainty and so petite
Easy done, the doctors say
We'll chisel out a bit

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

Skin not right, there's wrinkles there
It makes me look much older
Lift my face and smooth it out
I begged all the doctors
I need my face perfect to be
For a man to be attracting

Looked in the mirror and did not like
What reflected back at me

A spoiled b*tch, a selfish b*tch
One that's mean and nasty
It did not matter how much I changed
My semblance using surgery
Was not my face that drove them off
But what lay underneath it

What is the worth of a single man?
Does he have a price in gold, or maybe it’s water in a can?
What is the cost of a peaceful life?
Free? Or must there first be strife?
What is the value of love?
Does it have a value? Or is it a gift from above?
The answers lie in truth, although,
The question must be asked; do you wish to know?
And what is the truth worth?
Pain and suffering, sorrow and hurt?
For, many times, this is the price paid your whole life through.
Now. What is the cost of truth for you?

How is it how you interact
Can you communicate with ease
Can you deliver what you want known
Or do you just freeze

Do you have a silver tongue
That sneaks behind their guard
An loosens up their credibility
An opens up their heart

Be it the old lady down the road
Or the kid behind the counter
Can you treat both the same
An enjoy the banter

What about the aggro dude
Who's so into himself
Or maybe the ordinary girl
Whose confidence is on the shelf

What about the drunk
Whose life is somewhere lost
Or the rich fella in the suit
Who never wonders about the cost

Be it black white yellow or green
I dont really care
As long as i have interaction
Then communication i"ll share

For everyone has something to offer
No matter how it is portrayed
The value of such does differ
A long as the genuiness is paid

Paid by respect to whats on offer
Simple vision an simple terms
A nod a wink an honest smile
An conversation looms

Feed me, feed me, growls the machine
While it spews forth it's diesel fumes
Naked hunger shows through it's stance
As it claws and digs at the earth

Deeper it digs, never stopping once
Dirt piling up left and right
One by one mighty trucks roll up
To be loaded and take it away

All through the day and half of the night
The machine keeps digging away
Hunger not appeased, not satisfied
Until this land has been ripped open wide

today's rhetoric just makes me sick
"undue use of exaggeration or display"
say some bull and which details to pick
just ignore some facts that get in the way

is beneath contempt for well thought mind
and generally a nuisance for all society
won't solve problems and merely designed
to get one's way and claim soapbox piety

so before I go jump in some grandiose lake
and take argument hook, line, and sinker
to think I'll swallow it all is a mistake
I'll be my own man and a freethinker

take your bite, your blurb and try again
speak with intelligence and use your brain

© agoodguy2have 2011-06-29

Many years ago, when I was a volunteer non-combatant in South Africa’s apartheid war against Namibia,
I experienced a life-enriching phenomenon, which I would like to share with my fellow poets in this corner of the galaxy…
Why share? Well, I find myself a party to combat again, and introspection of how to peacefully settle the matter brought this incident to memory…,
Its serving me well now, just as it did several decades ago…


I was standing guard unarmed on ‘my’ side of the Zambezi,
On the other side was the ‘enemy’, of course…,
My fellow-soldiers, who for some unknown reason liked me, used to daily jibe me about ‘defending’ my country with my eyes, rather than an FN assault rifle…,
Fire was often exchanged between the Zambians and the South Africans across the mighty and drop-dead gorgeous Zambezi…,
Which, mind you, did not seem to deter the local crocodile and hippopotamus congregations, for whom life went on as usual…,
Neither did it stop the exotic fish eagles from emitting their haunting and beautiful cry as they fished daily at sundown…

However, to my utter astonishment, it did not deter another hardy trio,
Every day around sundown, a daddy, a mommy and a little girl with fiery blond hair, would come chugging along in their little fishing boat between the two groups in this war-zone,
The crocodiles leering hopefully at them…, and their fishing lines hanging overboard…

At first, my logical and protective mind criticized the parents for being irresponsible, but, a little reflection showed me that here were two advanced beings teaching us that the only thing to fear is fear…,
And that there are no ‘other sides’ to the Zambezi,
Just the eternal tranquil expanse,
On which, for fun, we get to choose our reality,
Peace or conflict…
May we all ‘requiescat in pace’ this side of the far side as well, instead of waiting for the other phenomenon…