Eucharist

For J.D.

by Richard Vallance

My American friend, his Word, the sonneteer's,

whose measured voice appears to cry in vain

for frail reforms to soothe his nation's tears,

has shed warm tears to eucharist its strain.

Whose blood, one asks, was this his groans deplore?

Democracy flails, bled bluish in its throes,

because Bush scrubs his hands in gory War

in lieu of nourishing Freedoms Christ bestows.

The roadside poor are left to rot, though ill;

the filthy rich waive nouveaux riche aside

from sinecures with lucre as they kill

their Golden Calves, and grin at Bush's pride.

"Has Katrina*, Bush, slapped your face?" We ask.

"Ask our blacks, our poor. Who'll take you to task?"

*For future generations of readers, the reference is to Hurricane Katrina, the most disastrous and murderous in America's entire history. No man is safe from the implacable furor of nature, not even someone as bloated with pride of self as George Bush. The New Orleans flood was not in the least "like a war zone," as Bush so vainly claimed at least twice in his vainglorious speeches. Katrina and the flood she unleashed can strike at any nation, poor or rich, just as the great Tsunami struck the Asian nations last December. No one is except. No nation can escape the fury of nature, not even America. It is telling that in a recent speech the U.S. president pleaded, "May God continue to bless America". "May" is the operative word. The better response would surely have been, "May God bless our poor, benighted world."

volume 9(6)

This poem is copyright © September 18 2005, Richard Vallance, all rights reserved.
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