Promise Lost, by Amory McKeever

Where is the country to which we pledged our honor
Where are the husbands we had hoped for our daughters
In this kleptocracy of white collars

buying votes for a dollar
It seems we've fallen much farther
Instead of knights in shinning armor
Who look out for our farmers

we get snake oil charmers

I pledged my allegence

I redressed my grievance

I swore an oath before God

That no matter how flawed

No matter how busted

This republic can be trusted

Our promise is not yet lost

so long as patriots pay the cost

Where is the future we hoped to build for our babies

Where is the love we had promised to our ladies
Because lately we've just become crazies
Like a pack of dogs full of rabies
Shaming ourselves for the dailies
Our sacred vows became maybes
For better or worse are just sayings

for broken hearts in the making

Where is the war we said would end all wars

So we can tell every mother

their children are safe at home

Not dying on some foreign shore

On behlf of the corporate board

An appeal to heaven dear Lord

Might be all I can afford

I pledged my allegence

I redressed my grievance

I swore an oath before God

That no matter how flawed

No matter how busted

This republic can be trusted

Our promise is not yet lost

so long as patriots pay the cost

Sawdust, by Amory McKeever

(image courtesy of Aida Makoto)

Cut down in our prime
split in twain
discarded like pain
to make something fine

So here we are
in mountainous piles
you can see for miles
carcasses of poplar

A graveyard of timber
the scraps off a table
the skeleton of a maple
going out with a whimper

What becomes of the orchard

miss the forest for the trees

every hunger you apease

ignores your hand in the torture

Plea mercy from the saws
no justice no peace
to know we've been fleeced
we can hear the applause

They took what they could
to craft what they want
like idiot savants
but we're more than just wood

We're living things just like them
they bloom from our work
we're the sun through the murk
there's no flower without a stem

And gathered in their rooms

adorned in decadence

they spared no expense

to ignore their own doom

To forget they were us
that the shine of their polish
is because we're demolished
they shall never discuss

They are merely what's left
when you shave away the damned
the poor and the scammed
their value is a theft

So here we lie
in mountainous piles
you can see for miles
the tree of life left to die