Post by jcallegash on Jan 21, 2009 16:18:18 GMT -8
I was asked to make a poem to celebrate the Inauguration of Barak Hussein Obama. I initially refused for a number of reasons, not the least of which were the rather Draconian conditions of the terms of my current bail status. A compromise however, allowed me to write the poem which was then read by a lovely woman. Her name escapes me, but she made a rather large splash as the nation’s first “Spokes-poet.” Sadly, she failed to read the second verse, which appears below:
PRAISE SONG
By J. Chauncy Allegash
On this day,
in you way, Rick Warren, at long last
Admit thou art Gay, and say:
“Glory be, that brings us here,
Oath-ing, Betroth-ing,
Thy will be done,
Chicago’s Favored Son,
For 44 is half of 88, and no liquor can sate,
Our thirst for Justice.
Awaken, oh sleeping Giant of Trade!
Thy handmaiden of Commerce, American Made!
Through Union Hall and Mill,
Solar-powered, Green-hued, A’window’d silled,
Loosen thy credit to flow like a Mother’s ‘abreasted milk,
And bring sweet release to thy American’d droned Mass.
Stolid, solid, the unemploy-ed Mob,
Smelling of failure and sweat, a Miasma of Shame,
Our huddled masses, yearning to breath free,
And live Free, with Entitlements.
On Taxes paid by thee, and me,
Strewn like bread upon the sea,
By a permissive, enabling G.
And, I, America,
Stand, shaky, quaky, heart-achy, ‘a-breaky,
Wiping runny tears
from white-be-crusted eyes,
And blink, ‘a-possum like, in the shimmering light,
Born again like the nation,
Crying, and ‘a-wetted, ready to be lifted up and Changed.
Having offered my praise song .
PRAISE SONG
By J. Chauncy Allegash
On this day,
in you way, Rick Warren, at long last
Admit thou art Gay, and say:
“Glory be, that brings us here,
Oath-ing, Betroth-ing,
Thy will be done,
Chicago’s Favored Son,
For 44 is half of 88, and no liquor can sate,
Our thirst for Justice.
Awaken, oh sleeping Giant of Trade!
Thy handmaiden of Commerce, American Made!
Through Union Hall and Mill,
Solar-powered, Green-hued, A’window’d silled,
Loosen thy credit to flow like a Mother’s ‘abreasted milk,
And bring sweet release to thy American’d droned Mass.
Stolid, solid, the unemploy-ed Mob,
Smelling of failure and sweat, a Miasma of Shame,
Our huddled masses, yearning to breath free,
And live Free, with Entitlements.
On Taxes paid by thee, and me,
Strewn like bread upon the sea,
By a permissive, enabling G.
And, I, America,
Stand, shaky, quaky, heart-achy, ‘a-breaky,
Wiping runny tears
from white-be-crusted eyes,
And blink, ‘a-possum like, in the shimmering light,
Born again like the nation,
Crying, and ‘a-wetted, ready to be lifted up and Changed.
Having offered my praise song .
