Our freedom of speech
First amendment guarantee
That can be abused
Shouldn’t we use commonsense
By thinking before we speak
An open question
To those that antagonize
Think consequences
.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Tag Archives: America
What Have We Become
What have we become?
Our government plays on our fears
To defend spying on its citizens.
NSA, CIA, FBI all have our dossiers,
How many other acronyms are prying
Weeding through our emails,
Monitoring our bank accounts,
Recording our telephone calls,
Scanning our mail?
A whistle-blower leaks your dirty little secrets
And you back peddle like lying politicians.
He’s committed treason you cry,
Turning the blame from yourselves as you always do.
Obviously our right to privacy means nothing,
You have no probable cause for surveilling us,
So you use the Patriot Act, loosely as disguise.
It hurts when you have been caught doesn’t it,
Like a kid with their hand in the cookie jar.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Author’s Note: This piece was prompted by reading the following short article http://goo.gl/wpkRZx. The information contained within it is not new, but it reignited my concerns about our federal government and our lack of privacy.
Black Smoke Wafts Skyward
Black smoke wafts skyward
Baltimore the latest nail
To be pounded home
How many more before the
Coffin is sealed and buried
Repeated killing
Just a different city
Will we never learn
These–our brothers and sisters
Share the same constitution
But not the same rights
They are treated as lesser
By their skin color
Disgusting as it may be
This is our America
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Our Tide In Great Waves Rolls Out
Our tide, in great waves rolls out,
Back to a dark and murky ocean.
So long we have struggled to crawl from the slime
To a place of light and enlightenment in this New World.
Holding up the Statue of Liberty as a sign of hope,
As a sign of our lust for freedom and equality,
We are showered in a torrent of our own hypocrisy.
There are brothers and sisters among us
That still struggle for whole-hearted inclusion.
Cast to the fringes they are ostracized and criticized
For their God-instilled proclivities.
As men, who are we to be judge and jury of our peers,
This was not ordained upon us by the Creator!
Time and again we wander this rocky treacherous road
Seeking to impose man’s prejudices upon men.
Would Christ whom you hold so dear have been this cold,
Tossing his brethren out into the desert?
You dredge up this muck with arrogance under the guise of freedom
Plotting all the time to shackle others for your cause.
Put yourself in your adversaries shoes,
Do they not feel worn out and ragged?
Early in this twenty first century I was optimistic,
Hopeful that common sense and compassion would prevail,
But now I am left disgusted and embarrassed.
Is this what America has devolved into,
A nation of oppression, prejudice and inequality
Based on twisted interpretations of God?
A travesty we have become…indeed!
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
A Cheeky Letter (Tanka)
A cheeky letter
Congressmen sent to Iran
Not very funny
Preferring war over peace
They commit acts of treason
.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Gone Are Those Days
Gone are those days
You know…the ones where our children are better off than we are.
What is better for them,
Saddled with debt for an education that guarantees them nothing,
Grown children living with their parents,
Prospects for their futures clouded,
Shadowed by unceasing war?
For many taking up arms for their country the only way to survive
Taking injury and death as necessary risks.
Is this what we wanted for our children,
Is this what our parents had hoped for us?
Where do they go from here in this country divided?
Everything is in turmoil!
The government is polarized,
The people brainwashed by extremist media.
Bankers, the greatest threat as described by our founders
Have slithered their way into our capital’s marble halls.
So much promise has been squandered.
This once great nation is sacrificing its young
And for what, pieces of gold,
A return to a past that has long since died,
Survival of the fittest where the rich become richer
And everyone else becomes irrelevant.
This is not the country I knew and loved,
It is an abomination of the worst kind
Feasting on the bones and blood of our children
To fuel its unquenchable lust and greed.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Our Past Watches
Our past watches modernity from the grave.
Sprawling fields of monument and headstone
Honor these souls that ventured on before us.
What must they think of this world as they look on,
Our never ending roadways,
Towering buildings of glass and steel,
Automobiles supplanting horse and carriage,
Our lack of respect for water, air and life,
Politics more polarizing than any in history,
Unquenchable greed marring its noble past?
Perhaps they are relieved to be in a better place,
Sleeping peacefully under a blanket of white,
Winter’s cold and man’s ignorance
No longer gnawing at their weary bones.
As we pass by should we not think of them,
Consider how far we have traveled,
How far behind we have fallen,
What we have lost,
What we have surrendered in frustration.
If we are to regain our souls,
Our greatness and our compassion,
Reversing this slide into oblivion,
These fields likely hold the key
Under their peaceful blanket of white.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Vultures Every One
Vultures every one, they pluck at the carcass.
Oh yes, it is dead and has been for some time,
But they choose to masquerade it in lively rhetoric.
Speaking not of how they will resuscitate the corpse
They prefer to spew bile at those they accuse of murdering it.
Solving nothing, they offer up a civics lesson as hope,
A promise of a return to days long gone by.
They know this can never be,
That we should never return to the cesspool of the past that got us here,
Still they desire with a selfish heart, to thrust this upon us.
No longer a land, by the people, of the people, for the people,
We have devolved into a country of the corporation,
By the corporation, for the corporation.
Our politicians, beholden to these behemoths disregard the people,
Believing their constituents too inept to notice.
Sadly, our elections show they are too often right.
Seats of government are filled with crazies, radicals and thieves
Looking to promote their own self-interests,
Their own delusional ideals,
The interests of those that bought their loyalty.
Their records show nothing but opposition to the other side,
No compromise, no debate, just blatant obstruction,
This they do, all the while claiming to be patriots and waving their tattered flags.
Perhaps we are as much to blame for this violent death as they.
Each vote cast inflicts another gangrenous wound on this once vibrant body.
I fear it too late for meaningful change.
Our young prefer social media and video games to interest in things political.
What the future holds is anyones guess,
But with crystal ball in hand I foretell a funeral, the body in shrouds,
No taps being played, no mourners present to pay their last respects,
They can’t because they are too busy texting and watching youtube to notice.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
It Is Ironic
It is ironic
Considered a democracy–
Republic really
We treasure our vote
Though in many ways a farce
Given candidates
By parties that are corrupt
These are our choices
Pick from the best of the worst
Either way they always win
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Gone
Gone
Greatness
This country
Spiraling down
Grand Experiment
Being stretched very thin
Perhaps it has run its course
Government is broken
Diplomacy dead
General angst
Future bleak
What next
Vote!
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Dom DiFrancesco 