Purveyors of hate
Attempt to intimidate those of unlike minds–
Turning to violence and angry rhetoric to force their points-of-view.
Reality eludes them as they long for their diluted utopia.
I do not despise my country nor my brothers,
Only those despots among us that desire to bastardize it in their image.
They and they alone are treasonous,
Ignorant and insidious,
Corrupting all that is good in the name of the flag.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
What have we become?
Both sides are fatally flawed.
We–the laughingstocks!
Politics are the cancer
Eating our nation alive.
Are we to perish,
Fading into history
Like Rome’s empire;
Remembered for its grandeur
Through its crumbling ruins?
Perhaps it’s too late,
Our experiment–a dream
May evaporate
Becoming just a footnote
In the annals of mankind.
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Looking back upon the boy of youth,
The world seemed such a hopeful place;
So full of promise and full of truth,
Enough for all the human race.
Government a partner and a friend,
One we did not need to fear.
Alway there with a helping hand,
Their mission statement was oh so clear.
Protect and nurture and not infringe;
The mandate since the fathers founded.
Avoid at all cost a spending binge;
Ideals of old were firmly grounded.
Now this world once so full of hope
Is sliding down corruptions slippery slope.
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
~
Authors Note: This is my first attempt at a sonnet, I know it isn’t quite as Shakespearean as Shakespeare would have liked it, but it seemed to work for the topic.
Its hard to believe that it is but a short dozen years
A dozen years since this world changed
Changed a nation and its ideals
The ideals founded on a promise gave way to extremism
An extremism not so unlike that of the terrorist
The terrorist has taken away our freedoms
Our freedom to assemble, our right to privacy
Privacy is a thing of the past taken away by our government
Our government says they must take it to protect us
Protect us from whom, who will protect us from them is the question
Questioning however, is taken as unpatriotic
Unpatriotic! This is our right and our duty as citizens
Citizens who have become nothing but pawns
Pawns to governmental corruption and big business
Business’ who are now treated as citizens by the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court who was supposed to keep the executive and legislative in check have let us down
Down are path I fear is collapsing
Collapsing with each step we take down the road
A road, one way, on which their is no return
Oh…to return our moral compass to true
Truly that would be our greatest strength
Strength of character, morals, of humanity that we so long ago lost
Lost to our greed, selfishness and intolerance
Intolerance for ourselves, other nations, other ideals
Ideals that were long deceased before September 11, 2001
September 11, 2001 was just another nail
A nail in a coffin already occupied
Occupied but not inescapable if we would try
Try to resurrect the intentions of our founding fathers
Fathers far wiser than the lot of thieves currently in office
Offices held by both parties
Parties that no longer represent the people
A people that deserve better
Better than to live without freedom, in oppression and under tyranny
.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
You blame the unions,
You blame the American worker,
Moving your plants overseas.
~
You say we want too much.
Is a decent quality of life too much,
A living wage to raise our families.
~
You take no blame on yourself,
Your greedy shareholders,
Gnarled hands outstretched,
Grasping for a greater piece of the pie.
~
You cry, profits are down;
Consumers aren’t buying!
You take our jobs away
Giving them to those in the third world.
~
No job, no money, no spending,
Where is your logic?
You ask for more from us
Giving us less for our labors,
Yet our bleeding is still not enough.
~
Our blood, our sweat means nothing,
No longer are we people,
No longer do you show us loyalty.
~
Profits reign king in your corrupt world
And we are merely paupers,
Struggling in your greed poisoned kingdom.
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
We are living in a land of broken dreams and promises,
Those with means, rush to deny what should be obvious to the rest,
Ha! It’s the Land of Opportunity, for whom I ask?
Common is it for the common man to grow then stagnate,
Trapped in the tracks of his caste.
Not for lack of desire, but of meaningful opportunity.
Crawling up and up only to find the steps paved in jagged glass,
Barefooted from birth we are cut and scarred with each step,
No red carpet nor ivory towers lay in wait.
Instead pittances to pacify the masses are offered to give hope,
Promises that they too are worthy of abundance,
These promises ring hollow…leaving us with the taste of sand,
While the oligarchy scoffs from their luxurious boardrooms.
Cries to the state offer little relief,
As they themselves are counted amongst the elite,
Leaving the rest to scrounge for scraps in their rubbish heaps.
This was not the promise of this once great nation,
Old money, family money, dynasties, unfettered corporatism…greed!
Safeguards dreamt by the founders have been tilled and buried,
Bastardized by modern men with corrupt ideals.
Shall we once again embrace…
The monarchy!
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Crawling to the edge
Thirsting for cool crisp water
We find a mirage
Nothing but sand, hot and dry
More lying and corruption
~~ D. R. DiFrancesco ~~
Age of statesmen gone
Left with only empty suits
Like their promises
A wealth of material
But nothing of true substance
~~ D. R. DiFrancesco ~~
By D. R. DiFrancesco
Not so very long ago
I dreamed of a utopia
Beautiful and green
Full of promise and hope
Then man got in the way
Swelled with pride,
Consumed with self-importance
Greedy, prejudice and hateful
He ravaged the land
Taking what he wanted and leaving it in ruins
Polluting our water
Poisoning the ground
Making it a malignant wasteland
Seeing fit to keep this to himself
We planted
We built
We raised our families upon this cursed soil
Ignorant to the damage being done
Chronic illness plaguing our children
They say it’s all in the name of progress
Complain and you are Anti-American
Speak out and you are unpatriotic
Protest and you are a Communist
Who will be held accountable
The autocrats claims a divine right,
All in the name of capitalism
But they don’t plant, build or raise their children on this putrid land
They cry fowl from their ivory castles
Waving their jeweled scepters
Hiding behind their detestable walls
Looking down upon those of us less fortunate
They watch us wither under the toil of our labor
Building for them what they could not build for themselves
Drawing every last breath from us
All for the sake of another dollar
When will they have enough
When will we be more than just expendable
If they have their way
Never
Think about this often
How petty we have become
Money, power, the big house; is this really important?
Money distorts,
Power corrupts,
The big house…a symbol of unnecessary opulence.
Those of unlike kind are frowned upon,
Lazy,
Bloodsuckers,
A drain on the system,
Is this what we have become?
Those with means holding us hostage,
Our station in life seals our fate,
Threatening to exterminate ones less fortunate,
All in the name of progressing their adgenda.
Civility and compassion tossed aside like so many feathers to the wind,
Cast out as unimportant,
So unnecessary in this capitalist system,
The needs of the few eclipse those of the many.
Talking heads and bureaucrats tow the line,
Telling us that this is our foundation,
Lies and deceit disguise their motives,
Their pockets lined with fools gold.
Still they profit at societies expense,
And we buy in to the hollow rhetoric,
Smiling and clapping as they spew their bile,
Blind to the parade marching to it’s own demise.
Our representation sold for profit,
With wealth comes power and the rise of aristocracy,
This was not the proclivity of our fathers,
Yet we watch it happen with hardly a noise.
Is this what is desired or desirable?
It can’t be…it mustn’t be our expectation,
Like mice we scurry away from that which is distasteful,
Rise up, speak up, demand your just due,
Tenacity in numbers can rejuvenate our future,
Forcing the tyrants to bow to our intentions.
Dom DiFrancesco 