Thoughts are provoking
When voiced in arrogant tones
A putrid venom
Raising the ire of foes
Stinging the hearts allies
A higher standard
We aspire to be held
This has always been
Yet we bully and coerce
We push, shove and we degrade
They aren’t our children
We are not their guardians
Ego says elseways
Sometimes it’s best to step back
Letting cooler heads prevail
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Born of arrogance
Ego–bullying nations
Cultivating hate
Surprised when once allies turn
Never learning from the past
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Race wars,
Culture wars,
Gender wars,
Drug wars,
War on freedom,
War on religion,
War on women,
War on drugs,
War on crime,
War on terror,
War, war, war–do you see the pattern!
Still we call ourselves peace-loving,
We call ourselves civilized.
Fighting against each other,
Fighting against our beliefs,
Fighting against enemies of our own design,
Intolerance of one another,
Physical and verbal violence
Waged against our own and the world,
Tell me–what is peace-loving and civilized about this?
We have been brainwashed–
Brainwashed by our government,
Brainwashed by the media,
Brainwashed by our own ignorance!
We continue this spiral into oblivion,
Year after year,
Decade after decade,
Century after century
As so many have done before us.
Perhaps one day we will learn
That constant war tires and diminishes a people
Until eventually they plunge into the abyss of history
–Under the weight of their own arrogance.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Blink and it is gone.
All that you took for granted–
Evaporated,
Because of insatiable greed
And deep-rooted selfishness.
Looking down from high
Upon those less fortunate
With smirks and disdain–
You should truly be ashamed!
Each dirty face could be yours
In a single blink.
It is that simple.
In this life or the next
There will be judgement.
Do you want to take the chance
That you’ll be the lesser soul?
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
With tears I say goodbye
Though I do not know your pain,
Nor the pain of your ancestors
Inflicted at the hands of those that look like me.
When I look in the mirror
I am not proud,
I am not proud of our past,
Not proud of of our inhumanity,
Not proud of the picture our hands are painting.
With a broad brush,
We paint in your blood,
Red and warm as mine
Though left to dry cold in the streets.
We stand around,
As if awaiting applause,
While your spirit fades,
Showing just how little we care.
I know this is not me,
Though I know you can’t see it;
And that these words are just words
Unable to bring you back from the dead.
Your family grieves,
But their grief is overshadowed,
Trampled down under the weight of constant diversions
Portraying you as something less than human.
Yet none of this matters!
Injustice cannot hide forever
Behind an iron blue citadel
Mortared with lies, racism and hatred.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
AUTHORS NOTE: I was not going to write another piece about the tragedy in Ferguson Missouri today, but I find Michael Browns’s death so troubling that I couldn’t help myself. His death in my eyes shows that racism still runs rampant in this country though many of us would prefer not to admit it. For those that would like to pretend this never happened, I think it is time you opened your eyes. Explain to me how being stopped for jaywalking could escalate to the point where a young man is shot six times and killed, then left alone in the street for so long. This is completely beyond my comprehension.
O’ blessed silence, how I long for thee,
Surrounded by ignorance and fools.
Blind to reality by refusing to see,
They’re being used as propagandist tools.
Is not an informed citizenry a wonderful thing,
With fact-based opinions at their core.
Sadly lost to the masses, they grasp for a ring,
Tarnished from a time long before.
It seems compassion’s lost to the hearts of fellow-men,
Leaving them cold with the worst traits thought past.
Rigid and hateful and unwilling to bend,
Claiming piety with iron-fist holding fast.
The softening of hearts would surely serve us well while still questioning those that lead us.
A sacred obligation as our founders did tell with diplomacy and respect to discuss.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Scattered amongst the ashes
A solitary flame flickers
Shedding light on the bleakness of this world.
Perhaps the next child born will be the one to save us from ourselves.
Each first breath offering hope
That our nescience is not irreparable.
Deeming ourselves civilized
We erect gauntlets against what does not fit our world view.
Denying climate change,
Though it stares us in the eye,
Forcing spiritual beliefs
All the while claiming discrimination,
Sloughing off cries of racism
Because admission would make us something less than human.
I see no light amongst the living–
Only more of the same driven by greed and selfishness.
If we are to be rescued it will be by a new guard,
One untainted by our perverted values,
One born with the humanity, the selflessness, the courage
To eradicate the filth that pollutes this planet
With their bastardized vision of God
And their gluttonous appetite for money.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Capitalist,
Socialist,
I am neither,
And both.
I am not proud that either need exist,
Each is distasteful alone.
Capitalism breeds greed,
The rich get richer,
The poor get poorer
Dividing their people.
Socialism strives to temper greed,
Reigning in its excesses
In hopes of leaving something for the masses.
Those with means rail against this,
Crying infringement!
“I don’t need the government regulating me,
I will give to others as I see fit.”,
This is not reality, but greedy folly.
Human nature believes what’s mine is mine.
Socialism is no less flawed!
Unfettered it breeds sloth,
Equally deadly and devastating.
Where is the incentive to contribute?
Both commit their own deadly sins by existing.
Perhaps a blending would suffice,
Capitalism for self-sustenance,
Socialism for a dose of humanity and conscience.
If arrogance were put aside
Maybe then there would be hope,
Hope that what is broken could be mended
For the betterment of all
–Not just the select few.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Corporate muscles flexed once again,
Trampling the rights of the common man.
What fools believe that corporations are people?
Why does one person’s belief trump that of another?
Where is the judicial in all of this?
Are they not charged with protecting the people’s rights?
They have become political tyrants,
Partisan and putrid as the legislative and executive.
“We The People” has become a joke;
Something relegated to the past,
Something we look back fondly on that once existed,
But sadly exist no more.
Individuals have no power to enact change
Where money and business rule.
Silenced by the dollar, we are ignored.
Was this erected in our framework,
Was this what the founders intended,
That man should be subjugated by greed and profit?
We cry foul at those who infringe on human and civil rights,
Yet we are nothing but hypocrites,
Infringing on the rights of our own.
There is no fairness under the law,
There is no justice under the law,
Unless you can afford to buy it.
Raise the gavel…
We’ve sold out to the highest bidder!
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Why I ask is it that we choose to destroy,
Leaving vast swaths of land ravaged,
Acres of ocean uninhabitable,
Water unfit for consumption,
Farms barren of life-giving crops,
Forests clear cut for human development
Exploitation of the gifts given to mankind,
Simply…I do not know!
Why is it that we deny the evidence,
Oceans rising to previously unrecorded levels,
Temperatures, the hottest in history,
Storms, perfect and oh so deadly,
Property destroyed and lives lost,
Still we refuse to believe,
Why–I do not know!
Why is it that we allow ourselves to be victims,
Plagued by profiteers,
Suffocated by our government,
Tolerant of our polarization,
Blind to our abuses,
Living as pawns to the powerful,
Yet we choose to ignore,
Why, I haven’t a clue!
Why we have allowed this to happen, I do not know,
We have become complacent,
Allowing our fellows to trample our dreams,
Stifling that which is our destiny
Instead of finding common ground,
Leaving us more distant than ever.
I wish I knew how to fix the ills of this world,
But I do not!
I like you, am only a temporary inhabitant,
Borrowing my time in this life.
Why must we destroy this precious world
Poisoning ourselves and those we love
With words and chemicals?
Material gain and profit are fleeting like this existence.
Shouldn’t we endeavor to make the most of what we’ve been given?
Isn’t this what it means to be human,
To use what we need leaving the rest for our future?
Perhaps I am naive,
A dreamer,
Or just hopeful,
But I must believe that it is not too late
For man to overcome his arrogance and greed.
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Dom DiFrancesco 