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Thank you to those who support me via my Paypal account: rikwrybac@yahoo.com. The government doesn't read my poetry. You do. Out of over 560 poems here on this blog by me, I hope you find one or more you like. Thank you for my readers. Thank you for your comments.

Saturday, September 30, 2023

The Shutdown

Shutdown

Shutdown the government say some
Let the halls become silent and dark
Return this nation to what was here before
Indigenous folk are ready rubbing hands
Around their waists are chains covered

In shiny new padlocks and handcuffs
Throw away the words of the Declaration
And burn all copies of the Constitution
If they want it back there will have to be
New documents that stand for the truth

How does anyone shut down equality 
Turn out the lights on already blind justice 
Where shall we meet to decide how poor
Elderly citizens will starve in cold homes
Who will become strange fruit in hot sun

Box freedom telling people that is all
There's only so much to go around today
Be sure to shred all the money in banks
Melt all the coins and turn in all bonds
Nothing has value until a new government

Let us gather to decide what this all means
There are no leaders so shut the old away
Until the nobodys filter to a new voice
Better than Franklin and good old George
All books of law are full of worms and wrong

There are no bills to pay until value establishes
In something better than gold, silver, and paper
With simple words agreed to write it all away 
Start it over to never care for your security
Let the States all die until a king is found

Make just one man decide for all people
Who will live and who will die by any decree
Line the naysayers up against existing walls
Bullets are free for believers to exterminate
All the children they want to bleed on streets

The victims no longer exist since power is all
The enemies come across all borders in peace
Willing to die for the nothing that now is wrought
Stone, paper, leather parchment cannot hold
What these acclaimed people glue with dust

Barry G. Wick




Thursday, September 28, 2023

We




We live with our choices and what is within us.  We live with what we see in the mirror.  We live with our illusions.  We live knowing we can't see how others see us.  Through these facts appear the ghosts of those who gave us life over all the centuries of the earth.  Boo!

Monday, September 25, 2023

Pitchman

Pitchman

He stands in front of the studio camera
This space is designed to tire and hammer
Only money or email will save
Everyone from geegaws not needed
But are supposed to crave

This studied pitchman 
Is magically slick
In a comfortable suit 
He asks his audience to pick
Whatever he's selling 
He answers all questions
In a calm steady voice
He says they're only suggestions

The world will never rid the glowing screens of them
They'll glow and they'll grow each with their own special gem
I haven't a thing to sell just silly old words
The world is chock full of spewed
Alphabetic  turds

Hart Crane raged his alcoholic depression
Wondering if his writing was any good
I'm depressed but haven't had a drink
In many years
I don't care if my poems are good or great
I made my decisions for all of it
This life will throw me off the ship
Soon enough whether anyone
Bought my pitch or not
I've been bobbing in the sea a long time
There's plenty of time to drown

Barry G. Wick





Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Beneath This Minute

Beneath this Minute


Beneath this minute
Are the lies I tell myself
I think I’m okay
No better and no worse
Than others around me
The truth is that I’m both
I don’t read enough
But I read more than most
I’m fat and want to lose weight
But I find myself in a monthly binge
My home is fairly dirty
Justifying not cleaning with painful shoulders

These older years have taught me
None of this matters
I will lie to myself whether I think not to lie
Or whether I think I change to the truth
What is most important in my breakfast
And the tea I will make for myself
I look to the stove and see its on
Heating the water in the kettle
The outside of the kettle is a bit greasy
But the water soon to boil will be clean
I think about what I will eat
And the two choices might wind up
As eating both to my detriment
So I lean into my brain and scream
You don’t respect me Mr. Brain

I’ve now jumped onto the side of the worse
All of this before breakfast
Of either dry something
Or fried something
The third option is
Search the neighborhood
For a pet
To rip its throat
With my teeth
To enjoy my vampire tea

Barry G.Wick







Sunday, September 17, 2023

The. Plastic Bag of Youthful Death

The Plastic Bag of Youthful Death


I threw away my journals
After many years of writing
Tiny letters upon painful pages
Just as I was making the me
So public that required I
Destroy my life before it
Went any farther so as
To have the many dig
Through those years 
Almost thirty years ago

All words from college
To Chicago on a train
Of paper rail cars
Now neatly shredded
By Craig's machine secretly
Screaming words torn
So they bleed into a plastic
Bag their letters separated
Much like cutting a chicken
Into unrecognizable parts
Only the shredders teeth
Will enjoy these memories
unseasoned and raw

These many minutes with
Multiple books all five
With many pages 
Of black inked dreams
And lovers kissed or held
Reduced to indecipherable 
Polluted trees for the benefit
Of others who don't want
The real me to read as
I've always done thinking
What others may want from
Me instead of me for me
Happily me on my terms

I've now discovered this branch
Where I don't drag all that
With me across the tear-soaked
Years that shadow other writers
Full of childish learning
Fumbles on the paginotions
My own word of my own life
Belonging to me doing it better
For no one else alone
Or read to a crowd I'll never meet
The ridiculous boredom
That clouded Larkin and others
Like Rochester telling me
She thought the painting
I bought for forty bucks
Should be destroyed 
Like young men's words
No one can stand to read


Barry G. Wick