No Need To Even Stay Angry

Too damn late to prevent

Too far gone to save

Too expensive to restore

Too certain for any further concern

No stopping what’s already done

No need to harbor those stale regrets

No more fingerpointing in infinite loops

No turning back - We’re already there

It’s a done deal, so we need to move forward

It’s not a debate we must have anymore

It’s time to adapt without doubts and/or fears

It’s over now and those days are not coming back

There’s no more hurry to fight this problem

There’s no longer a point to talking costly prevention

There’s no reason to keep stalling for more study

There’s no need to even stay angry

The time has passed

The hour is over

The tipping point lies behind us

The inaction was quite decisive, once again

Now events have ended all debate

Now that it’s over, we must move on

Now we can just react without thinking to save our families

Now our children won’t have to decide

That issue is far behind us now

That argument timed out long ago

That fervor is no longer heated

That controversy has been laid to rest

Any recrimination is now quite futile

Any new tears now merely blind us

Any more time spent is simply wasted

Any regrets now will only slow us down

We were mostly unable to try to stop it

We can’t act on that anymore

We must begin to heal and get on

We shall, however, remain quite proactive, nonetheless

Just Dirt

Just: 1) Only, merely or simply “It’s just a joke” 2) behaving according to what is morally right and fair “A just cause”

Simple dirt, this living soil, fed by our ashes and the slowly decaying plants that we had nurtured

Just dirt…that is, righteous dirt. The ancient healing earth, our silent and loamy benefactor

The rich-smelling, good-tasting, long-lasting, crop-nurturing humus that provides for us all

Those happy dirty children, those wagging dogs rolling in good dirt, this tired farmer’s dirty hands

Dirt shoved aside, carried off, compressed into lifeless, random heaps, dumped and forgotten

Carelessly robbed of its roots and enslaved by the pitiless alien lords of industrial agriculture

Carried off with all the chemicals they so often overuse to kill profit-cutting weeds and pests

They forced up some crops, got their bonuses and left us to just watch the poisoned soil blow away

Just dirt beneath our bare brown feet, this so-simple dirt that we simply cannot live without

The ground a living layer filled with bacteria and microbes – they who share almost all of our DNA

Honest dirt, from which we were created and will return, according to so many of our religious myths

Dirt Simple some say, but we know it’s much more, that close-knit, moist and dark bio-community

Crusted with salt left by their dried up fossil water, magnifying and wafting toxins into the air

Preserved with all the care of cost accounting, then sold off for yet one more lame, cloned stripmall

Casually raped with grunting, smoky-toothed bulldozers, auctioned off to the highest bidder

Torn up, trampled down, littered upon - then ignored, scorned and casually pissed on…in passing

This land that my family farmed with love for generations, the good earth that we so treasured

Magically bringing forth the food that supported us and our livestock, and even the wild birds

We paced it and crumbled it between our fingers, for its health defined our very sense of well-being

Planted the trees that blocked the wind to help to hold the soil - and we pulled the weeds by hand

All forms of toxics are spilled on, drained into and buried under it:And we are ashamed of being dirty

Naked too long, growing cracked and hard, unable to sponge up the gentle rains anymore

You - go pour this stuff out over there in the dirt, and hurry up, we got more real work to do

Scoop it out by the ton, crush it, wet it down, chemically extract and leave it laying in leaching piles

Walking barefoot amid the seedlings in a warm summer rain, babies with us as we tend our fields

Turn it over gently to smell the richness of the spring, rejoice over the good rain, along with the soil

Bury grandfather with our ancestors in this land he loved, ache in spirit along with the drought

Built our home with the mud and straw from this place, drew sweet, clean water from beneath

Crowned with rusting metal, faded plastic, and broken glass, now it oozes awful liquids

Absolutely ignored until it accidentally fouls us while on our busy, self-important errands

Feces mixing in with the mud, poisoned, but still able to harbor disease-inducing micro-organisms

Upon catching our drifting mercury and lead, hydrocarbons and PCBs, its toxic dust fills our lungs

Just dirt, a rich home, the very source of all our sustenance, that ultrathin skin of the earth

Ours to use up and despoil, waste and defile, gouge and quarry, in absolutely any way we see fit

Miraculous, fragile blessing built over thousands of years, we must preserve it for our children

Let it dry up, die and blow away, WhatEver, but hey, we intend to remain, purposefully unaware

When The Dump Burns Again

I’ll stay out here with you when the dump burns again

We’ll all be together when there aint no more MacNuggets

Still be by your side when all the Wal*Marts close down

And we’ll shuffle off to nowhere on streets with no traffic

We’ll sit and just watch as the next sandstorm approaches

Marvel at the difference with so many less people

May god bless us and keep us in merciful ignorance & poverty

And, lo, I will come fetch you when this rodeo’s over

Ask for me where every moonrise looks quite upside down

Walk with us to enjoy a bloody red, slaughterhouse sunset

Help us stack this old cardboard into our newest shelters

Laugh with us when we realize nothing will ever make sense

Give up your privacy for our sacred national security

Grab a place in any new line without even first asking why

He’ll be back soon – and He’ll be bringing us money & hope

But for now, just watch them parade til the dump burns again

Up above, colorful balloons will still keep us amused

Then it’s off to California with our guns and old bible

We’ll guzzle factory spring water & toss away the plastic bottles

We’ll kill for our god cause He said the infidels must pay

My sister is a saint but your mothers are all dirty whores

Off in the future, I often hear the grandchildren curse us

Stay back from the windows cause they’re still throwing bricks

See the dump burn again from our pink plastic lawnchairs

We’ll sleep in old SUVs & gnaw rancid Slim-Jims

I’ll shoot first and ask later, if I hear anything move

We’ll wonder with others what happened ta them Hollywood stars

It wont be too long fore none of the kids read at all

We’ll finally get away from them intrusive over-regelaters

But when we ransack the stores, the stuff sure does stink

We’ll fight over Twinkies but we wont find no more beer

Tell us again how sweet your big shiny pickup once sounded

When the dump burns again we’ll scatter like some uncovered bugs

But, there’ll be no time for sorrow with so much blood on our hands

We’ll stone those furtive CEOs who led us astray in fine suits

And the kids just won’t stop asking – Do we all really live only to suffer?

There Was A Time...Then We “Grew Up”

There was a time, not too long ago, when it seemed we could get things to make sense, once again

But, now, dear friends, as we grow so old so quickly, it’s gotten far too late to make any real amends

We had our chances and our great potentials, lives starting out below clear skies and fresh rainbows

That was a time before the pursuit of our happiness morphed into a vapid, blind & destructive greed

We had a chance to make a difference but instead chose to lurk beneath a dark corporate anonymity

But there really was a time when it would not have to have turned out in this reckless & empty way

It is not evil that drives us now, but rather a hedonistic, shortsighted lifestyle filled with empty noise

As CEOs, huge bonuses met by a responsibility to stockholders for short term profits became our goal

Once we stood tall, lean, long-haired & clear-eyed with a mind to make things better in this world

Now our strength lies in an angry bellowing catechism of for-profit Faux News Neocon soundbites

We looked upon our elders as some strange & alien race with which we had nothing in common

Today we friend our kids, expensively trying to curry their favor as we helicopter their every step

There was a time when we learned to work with our hands – building, repairing and improving

Now our people do all that sort of thing for us, our precious time being far too valuable to squander

Once we cooked for ourselves & others without any factory food containing 50 or more ingredients

Today, the processed food industry meets our needs from Natural to Lean and everything in between

We were filled with yearning for the Great West and hitched all across the Intermountain wonderland

Currently our vacations are lame cruise ships, lumbering RVs or tacky, polluted tourist destinations

Our work had to challenge us, make a difference and contribute to some kind of progress for society

We morphed into a herd of brown-nosed suckups, shoulder-climbing & down-kicking towards success

There was a time when we searched for soul mates to walk with beneath that rainbow for a lifetime

Laying awake after another brutal verbal slugfest we wonder - Where has that other person gone?

Peace and good brotherhood would help remake the world in a kinder, gentler and safer way

Now we uncritically support each dEfense increase and clamor to bomb places we can’t find on maps

Somehow we didn’t think it was stupid or useless to study earth science to try & help save the planet

Luckily, we got our MBAs part-time at night and worked our way up to empty project manager jobs

Long ago learned the lesson that alcohol was a whole lot more dangerous than Mexican ditch weed

Graduated to designer vodka martinis every freakin night and learned to mainly ignore the hangovers

Took up meditation and brain wave control with an eye towards cultivating an inner spiritual growth

Now we make irreversible and guilt-free decisions in private council with our mass Personal Saviors

Took long hikes & backpacking trips far out into the glorious mountain wilderness savoring the silence

Now we clamor for all our national lands to be accessible to our unmuffled ATVs & snowmachines

Spent years trying to become educated reading hundreds & hundreds of diverse authors & subjects

All information is now but a simple click away and we no longer require any studious concentration

We would hold politicians to high standards of decency, honesty and morality, for the good of us all

Now we parrot their marketer’s soundbites & vote for those whose masters outsource our way of life