I feel the pain with my last dying breath as the warmth of crimson surrounds me. My legacy will be the chalk outline I’m soon to become ‘til washed away by the acid rains.
Whether black, white or blue, does it really matter when you’re dead.
…Death is color blind!
~~ 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 ~~
I look upon such great divide
Families fighting through verbal battle
No middle ground, forced to choose sides
Opinions grasped like so much chattel
~
Scarcely since Our Civil War
Have differences raised so much ire
Tell me–what is all the anger for
Fueling tinder to spark the fire
~
Inundated torrent of adapted news
All with clearly chosen leanings
Partisan sides, a burning fuse
Caring not for truth or meaning
~
We drink like cattle at the trough
Hearing what we choose to hear
Everyone else’s minds gone soft
Perpetuating mood of hate and fear
~
One and all looking for someone to blame
Misplaced trust keeps fanning the fire
As rhetoric strives to focus their aim
Their lust for blood on a funeral pyre
~
Once an asset was a public informed
Now we are led astray like sheep
Our minds and senses propaganda stormed
To the point we dream it in our sleep
~
Questions arise, what liar to believe
None of them are worthy of trust
Making their quest to cheat and deceive
We pray their riches turn to rust
~
When oh when will we ever learn
Its up to us to force a change
Instead, watching while we crash and burn
Isn’t our complacency rather strange
.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
I feel not so inspired these days
The drudgery of our existence weighs heavy on me
Our division as a people
Who in times of crisis would unite
No longer seem capable of finding common ground
Certainly those that wish us harm must be in good humor
How foolish we must look
Dressed in our Sunday finest
Preaching…”In God We Trust!”
But trusting in no one but the self
I can do nothing to alter the fact
There is no election to hold
I can scream but no one can hear
Those in guilded monuments are deaf but to themselves
So here I sit with a cup of stale coffee
Choking down the morrning news
Chewing my nails to nubs in nervous anticipation
Only to be swallowed up in disappointment…again
Where are we going
I don’t think anyone knows
Those with the map…they too seem lost
Lost in their maze of arrogance
And we are the ones left in the darkness
•
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
I do not forsake my opinions
Nor do I feel need to come to their defense
I will not erect ramparts to protect them
I will take your barbs
Take the sting of your venom
Take the cuts and bruises
From your razor-sharp sarcasm
This I do with a smile
Biting my tongue
For fear of regrettable retort
Absorbing in silence
Your contrary views
Out of respect for you
Out of a right to form your thesis
As I would expect be offered me
Shocked and dismayed
It was not
This I will shoulder with grace
Never to diminish my love for you
Regardless of our divergence
These are merely words
At times fiery and inflammatory
Still…only words
That will never divide
~~ D. R. DiFrancesco ~~
By D. R. DiFrancesco
~~
Faces of color,
Eyed through blinders of suspicion,
Had we not buried this decades back,
People minimized for political gain.
~~
Grasping for a solution,
The problem steeped in your imagination,
You’ve convinced yourself this is righteous,
Yet racism and bigotry fester in you.
~~
This is not sacrosanct,
Taking hold of the weakness of the innocent,
Illegitimizing their right to be represented,
All for an ideal that isn’t your own.
~~
The media claims to be fair and balanced,
While corrupting your mind,
Brainwashing you with their hatred and mistrust,
As you mindlessly tow their party line.
~~
You despise him as an archvillain,
Is it his race, what you perceive his religion to be,
Is it his name, his father, his mother,
All targets of your aggression.
~~
Your side spouts lies,
Making claims they know to be blatantly false,
Saying whatever you want to hear,
Sycophants following like lambs to slaughter.
~~
This is what they want from you,
Belief in a past that can’t be resuscitated,
The future won’t settle for the lesser,
Still you continue to drink from the tainted well.
~~
They view half of us as leeches,
Feeding off of the system for our own personal gain,
Who are they, the elderly, children, disabled,
Do not judge them unless you have walked in their shoes.
~~
A sad state of affairs,
Pitting brother against brother and sister against sister,
The weapon of words no less brutal,
Leaving victims on both sides bloody and disillusioned.
Image credit: theatlantic.com
Dom DiFrancesco 