I understand the Deplorables

Those lives that every day peer

into burned out, low down, blood-spotted, 

dirtied air and flooded streets.

I  see them bury their young

from bullets or meth. 

I see what breaks them, 

what has been injected 

with capital’s 

hypodermic’s plunger.

I see their work schedules, the price of eggs.  

I see their souls scared

purple and blue, their lives fragile

as sea shells, 

and I understand why they move 

their hearts from their own chests 

into the chests of Trump, Jesus, Lenin, 

Hitler, Dr Phil.  

Because they are alone and unable

to get what they need, what we all need.

Because we all are the wrong age, 

skin, weight, profession, religion, gender.  

Even I with some privilege want more God/Marx/Magic, 

whatever lets people inherit their own Earth.  

Because it was not he/she/it who 

set things up like this. 

This obscene land of begging 

and obscene stealing. 

The Jeff Besos ilk who smash paychecks

of millions of bread winners 

to enlarge their own monster jackpots.  

And everyone who wants change 

is so afraid to burn down the banks 

because they tag you as Commies

or dummies. 

Because the politicians always say 

it’s the wrong time, 

the wrong candidate

 —but mostly the wrong time —

for health, 

for tuition, 

for teachers, 

for wages, 

for peace, 

for resistance, 

for everything. 

But it is always the right time

for Exxon 

for Lockhead 

for Harvard grads

for the F.B.I. and

for not  

burning down this house 

of emptiness and terrible crimes.

For not building a house 

of prosperity

that stretches to all the Detroits, 

that turns rivers transparent 

and blue again, 

and grows fish that aren’t leaking,

and furnishes fresh green 

things—bell peppers and apples,

and small farms to replace liquor stores,  

and lets air smell  like orange peels

and eyes light up again

for another golden age—

a post Wall Street uber alles 

renaissance—when

finally the gods 

step down from the sun

and fill the void again.