Some Richly-Deserved Side-Effects

“Deserved: Highly merited and just” – Oxford English Dictionary

We’ve always cheered on attention-obsessed, big-lie pushing sociopaths instead of real leaders

Thus, we have earned the right to enjoy repression, poverty & war under their vanity-driven regimes

We demanded ever-increasing dEfense budgets as we patriotically slashed education & entitlements

Guess we shouldn’t be too surprised that some 71% of those aged 17-35 fail military admission tests

Coal marketeers assured us mountain top removal, mercury & CO2 emissions were safe for families

So ADHD kids cough as we adjust thermostats to T-shirt comfort in record heat, under polluted skies

They promised us the better jobs of tomorrow and lots of savings when they sent our jobs overseas

But, instead now they offshore both engineering and design just to keep their huge bonuses flowing

Big Oil said fracking would patriotically yield us clean Energy Independence from greedy arab sheiks

Really, they’re sticking us with no alternatives and the cleanup exporting that Energy Independence

You always sarcastically dismissed their socialist nannying over smoking, obesity and lack of exercise

OK, but diabetes got your foot, just breathing is hard and your heart is simply shot-Happy Ever After!

You proudly made damn sure they never passed any form of gun control WhatSoEver - Gotnam it!

But they watch your every move & know all about your guns, when you use them & how to take them

Yes, you’ve stockpiled guns & ammo against gov’t drones and those black UN helicopters in the night

But I’ll bet you’d just wind up shooting each other over food scraps from your faux-military pickups

You spent thousands of hours at boring jobs ‘just can’t waiting for’ that next big 3 day weekend

But you can’t remember which from when and somehow most of the selfies got lost on your phone

You knew better than to waste precious tax$ on that, whatever it was, national infrastructure scam

So it’s cool that the water’s bad, the roads are worn out, the grid is broken and the internet is slow

You scornfully reject that dam Obamacare – Yup, to hell with them moochers and gov’t death panels!

But you did wind up paying a parasite lawyer to guide you thru your healthcare-induced bankruptcy

You spent thousands playing the fool just to be sure your precious children would be your friends

Apparently it worked cause now it looks like they’re back home to stay: 30ish, jobless & in debt

With all the cool stuff you really needed, you never even saved enough for one family emergency

Then, your unexpected forced early retirement at 55 left you deep in debt, depressed and unhealthy

Corporate scientists introduced many time & money-saving chemicals they never had to safety test

Now all our kids are lazy, autistic, sickly slow learners and we’re all obese & pre-cancerous

It was easy to ascribe the terrible sufferings of others to your omnipotent God’s mysterious ways

Feels different now that you’re weak & old, the wife’s demented and your kids only call for money

You always said you’d never want to live to be 60 and those old people had a for-real duty to pass

Turns out that 80 is the new 60 since every new expensive medical trick is paid for by your Medicare

You derisively rejected their calls to recycle and smirkingly dumped your household toxics as well

If your dumbdowned heaven existed, you’d see grandkids cursing you as they mine your filthy legacy

You studied only pointless sports stats, twisted political soundbites and smarmy blockbuster lines

Got any hipster clichés now as you lay, tubes going in and out, so very still & pale-On your deathbed?

So Many Ways I Lost My Way

I simply could not locate that must-have, on-sale eToy of my dreams - Though I saw that others had

Then, with no service bars and no wi-fi in range, I really hadn’t the slightest idea which way to turn

At home, something was wrong, all we could click up were the 300 loser channels we never watched

I grew confused by the media hydra of conflicting opinions, all spewed out as gospel & patriotic truth

I could not find our cart amid what seemed to be thousands of crowded & labyrinthic Wal*Mart aisles

Stumbling clumsily through all the rubble, I noticed it did not matter anymore, which way I turned

One day, mouthing buzzphrases, I didnt know if I was a progressive liberal or a conservative hardliner

Suddenly one evening, stuck on the freeway, I realized that no exit could ever take me home again

Got hammered and woke up parked by a smelly, overflowing dumpster at some rundown apartments

Lost my way staring into the sun pilgrimaging thru their fly-plagued & god-forsaken desert holy lands

Tried believing each & every political ad but that only led me into a maze of hilarious contradictions

Riding my new ATV onto BLM lands, I strayed off into a tangle of god-fearing, libertarian bandit trails

Grew confused wondering why there was so much hatred between so many, so similar, religious sects

Never could locate those 1% CEOs scuttling off roach-like to hide beneath a dark corporate anonymity

Wasn’t sure who to turn to when my kids stopped being my friends & my wife got the menopause

When I received my diagnosis, I suddenly realized how alone I was, right in the middle of everybody

After my 4^th layoff & downsizing, I considered I might be off the path to that Happily-Ever-After

When my doctor & insurance company both cut me off I turned to a faith in God for all my ills & bills

Grew ever more bewildered just trying to obey that needlessly massive & criminally cryptic tax code

When alcohol failed to comfort me I groped in wild desperation for my own mass personal savior teat

Blinded for years by the lies of a liberal media I was barely able to see the light of right wing gospel

The issues all seemed very complex but luckily the pithy Tweets of trusted media leaders led me thru

I couldn’t locate the hated enemy’s land on a map but I knew our drones would find their evil targets

In a moment of deathbed lucidity, I saw the endless sales of the Very Latest had lead me only to this

Couldn’t figure out why, though all the boxes & cans got smaller, the prices were not lowered at all

Never understood how so many people kept living in filth on a dollar a day - without any hope at all

Didn’t make sense that the government subsidized snack foods and paid for my diabetes & SSDI

Quit trying to figure out why our spending power decreased even while heroic CEOs grew ever richer

Got lost in the acres of giant pickups each parked & ready to clumsily haul one fat commuter around

Never again was the man I only thought I had been before I blew out my knee - Unloading groceries

Went astray in my pursuit of individual happiness what with all the noise, smoke, litter & neon lights

Did not see how bursting into girl’s elementary schools with AK-47s blazing punished the Great Satan

Finally got time to go over to Ma’s, but it was all dark & dirty like nobody’d been there for months

When I momentarily lost my faith I was quickly paralyzed by scores of painfully-conflicting soundbites

I’m pretty damn sure that Lotto ticket I lost last year was my Triple Pick, retirement-funding winner

So, with all the confusion in the herd it was no real surprise I lost my own personal sense of direction

From Beneath The Surface

Did not have the time to say it all

So I learned I must stay real small

Just tried to make sense of what I knew

In the end I saw just how foolish it all grew

Could not stay to help their grieving

Flies commenced to buzz as I was leaving

Guess I was lost this whole damn way

No wonder I never planned out where I’d lay

Laid out looking up at all them stars

Their blue was cold and that black was far

Felt tiny snowflakes dancing upon my nose

dreams touched my heart while I dozed

Came across those things that you uncovered

Watched sand blow over what I discovered

Saw the river’s ancient canyon stage

As I divided my years by this world’s age

Learned to pause yet I never stopped

Thought I could listen while I hopped

Saw speckled horses and an old log fence

Finally got used to things not making sense

The pieces you found did not quite match up with mine

It merely seemed we all pursued different lines

Stayed a while where the dust was clean

Til they sped by in new and shiny, closed machines

Began to howl to spread my sad news

Never did gamble, but still learned to lose

I might have come from any gypsy stock

Carved out our initials upon that rock

Turned it all quite upside down on purpose

Things looked blurry from beneath the surface

Looked for myself on snowy mountains

Most found my anger quite astounding

Scuffled savagely over smallest scraps

Licked my wounds between hungry naps

Lost the race I never knew began

My hair grew too wild and my face too thin

Lay drugged and watched my fluids fill their tubes

Ran all day, back when my joints were lubed

Lost all those memories I had finally gathered

Thought I got soaked but was merely spattered

Could not stay quiet as we all stood still

Made things harder thanks to my foolish will

Felt the grace in those huge blue swells

Helped myself and left my kids the bill

Knew in my gut that it all must end

Had neither time to help nor money to lend

At last I grew just a little thankful

Finally realized I owed this monstrous toll

Had a blurry vision of me off in peace and light

Began to wake up sweaty in the dark of night

Tried hard to change it all for good

Everything hurt when I finally understood

For a while it seemed things might just improve

Then came the morning my legs would not move

Crushed fine objects in darkness stumbling

Things got broke whenever I started fumbling

Studied empty scenes of starkest devastation

Heard sisters whispering over my evisceration

Overheard the voice of their gods almighty

Grew sad to realize they did not speak to me

Ruined many fine things in my short time

Under the patient trees I relived my prime

Always spiced up my own plain food

Came across as chiseled out just a bit too crude

Took a hard fall and badly twisted a firm belief

She thought me wise but I merely sought relief

It grew too smoky to recover any left-behinds

Questioned their ways and was treated less than kind

Never took warm comfort from friends or family

But clutched at them all as I slowly slipped away

Cast widely for some sanity with a narrow beam of reason

Got mixed up by faith and lost my way amid broken dreams

A Mostly Empty Mass Existence

There wasn’t much behind their loudly-blared patriotism beyond a violent, media-induced insecurity

Twerking their devices was but the latest way of avoiding any unpleasant metaphysical speculation

Their lite, cool & refreshing factory beer was merely littered cans of empty, brain-damaging calories

Beloved news hosts were simply parroting paid sponsor’s highly-charged, truth-twisting fake news

Their sacred TV sports were devoid of real meaning but did serve as wondrous corporate cash cows

Dusty & irrelevant religious faiths were shown to be as effective as any miracle fat-burning placebo

The annual Christmas binge was based only on co-opted, hyper-marketed faith and sales guilt pitches

Their kid’s potentials remained virtually unlimited but...A dying world mostly denied their expression

Immersion in the richness of literary experience was replaced with a self-immolation in vapid tweets

Reasoned debate was recast as the simultaneous, loud & angry shouting of half-truths & outright lies

Sentenced to work til 75, most over 50 were permanently outsourced & broke - yet loaded with debt

Seniors searched for meaning in their empty lives via expensive visits with Medicare-funded doctors

A career spent asskissing, backbiting, shoulderclimbing & downkicking left CEOs empty, but well-off

Bulky legal documents, for which lawyers over-billed, were easily summarized in 2 simple sentences

All their pleasure from new ATVs & snowmachines evaporated almost as fast as the gas they wasted

The noble pursuit of individual happiness morphed into a meaningless quest for the Next Big Thing

The factory food they were fattened upon provided no real nutrition but did fill them with additives

Turned out the Holy Free Market controlled demand by depleting resources & exterminating species

Their greatest life experiences actually occurred in a numbed immersion in empty corporate media

All the sports stats, movie lines & snarky soundbites afforded not 1 bit of comfort on their deathbeds

Though filled with emotionally-charged & stirring rhetoric, costly political ads were very low on truth

Looking ripe & juicy under special store lights, BigAg tomatoes & peaches were floury & taste-free

Upon review, their many tweets, texts & updates proved to be as lame as they were inconsequential

All their patriotic chest-beating against gun control really only encouraged more meaningless deaths

They waited impatiently for weeks on miserly 3 day holidays, which they forgot in near realtime

The sacred doctor-patient relationship morphed into 8 minutes of computer questions & another Med

After 40 years of a wonderful marriage she quietly asked him who he was, whenever he came to visit

Most of their treasured artifacts were sold, donated or discarded by their busy remaining next of kin

They smoked noisily about in clumsy pickups with huge beds they strove to keep very clean & empty

They felt free to decry climate scientist’s fuzzy math though they themselves could not make change

Declaring people to be their greatest asset, they ordered new layoffs & hired more benefitless temps

Politicos had to be highly-skilled at taking 5 minutes to not even answer a simple yes or no question

The 8 snack aisles were a nutritional desert, but rich in subsidized fat, sugar, salt & toxic chemicals

Vast numbers were pushed thru schools & released nearly illiterate & innumerate - But prison-ready

The dignity & sanctity of human existence decreased in direct proportion to an increasing population

Every god’s brand of eternal paradise was a mere fairy’s tale but, at least, the faithful never knew