It’s easy for me to rant
about things as they are,
but I need to get beyond the “can’t”
and seek the thing nobler by far.

I’ve written in protest
and marched side by side.
“Fear not,” is Jesus’ request —
a mantra and spiritual guide.

“Fear not, fear not, fear not,”
banishing all things fraught.

Whenever I hear anything, I mean
anything at all, about the president,
I become a spiritual failure
and curse worse than a @#$%^&*@#$%!!!!!!! sailor:
I am so embarrassed that he
is at the helm;
I am just overwhelmed
that the US has become a
@#$%^&*@#$ netherworld realm
run by psychos, sociopaths, sycophants,
all that should be banished
to Hjelm,
an uninhabited Danish island,
which would then become hell.
The Danes are the happiest people
in the world who obviously aren’t
in touch with reality
and could use an
attitude adjustment promptly.
They need to live for awhile with our
Federal administration’s banality.
I know that would be a slap in the Scandinavian face
but would give us a little breathing space.
Besides, my wife would like me
to quit being a spiritual failure and
stop swearing like a @#$%^&*@#
sailor, with apologies from
my wife to all those sailors
and thank you for your service to the country.

I don’t know why but I’m really
uncomfortable in the presence of
sociopaths and psychopaths. It’s
disquieting, disorienting, disturb-
ing. This morning when I took the
dog out to do his business, I heard
this burst of air in the woods like
a water sprinkler was about to start –
ppssshhtt — and I was going to get
soaked. Water sprinkler in the woods?
Then I thought perhaps it was the
rattle of a poisonous snake except
I’m not in Arizona this time of year
and I live in the one county in the
lower peninsula that doesn’t have
poisonous snakes. The dog and I went
back inside. I fixed him his break-
fast and then I thought again about
how uncomfortable I am in the presence
of sociopaths and psychopaths and
then I went online and went to Yahoo
to get the day’s news and realized
we are all right there — in the
woods with strange sounds, poisonous
snakes and sociopaths and psychopaths.

The commentator asked,
“When will the fever
break?” and the listener
knew experientially exactly
what the metaphor meant.
He felt it in that moment —
relief from the pain, the
heat, the sweats and then
the cool breeze blowing
over his exhausted,
enervated body. “When
will the fever break?”
as if to make a question
into an affirmation of
what will happen. Hold
on; keep hope; a cool
wind is coming blowing
a wonderfully dry
breeze over our
political scene.
When will the fever
break? Have faith;
the fever will break.
It always does.

I hope the president’s
dumb and dumber,
ugly and uglier,
crude and cruder,
mean and meaner
tweets won’t stop,
because, eventually,
then the man who
delusionally dreams
of being on top
will be all alone
with only his phone
and his tweets
to keep him company,
before the men in white coats
strap him in a straight jacket
and accompany
him out of the White House
into psychiatric care
and eventually the big house,
hopefully putting an end
to our national nightmare
and his making money off the
American public by the only
thing about which he cares —
his dishonest, moneymaking rackets.

Bona fide demagogues ask, tell,
and then send others off to jail or hell.
Scientists are told to change their story
and if they refuse, they are
eliminated from work at the least,
and, perhaps, sent on to glory.
Fortunately, for us thus far in
the United States, the only threats
out of one pretend or wannabe demagogue
are the manic tweets of insipid epithets.

We have blown off nuclear
bombs in our oceans,
because no one will ever
notice what we have done
under cover of the ocean’s
surface absorbing,
life-giving sun.
We have blown all the
water-life’s cover
but now the ocean is, like
all life, struggling to recover
from what we have done.
The sea, the land, the air —
all waiting for us to be gone,
so they can all then
breathe free and avoid humanity’s
inevitable denouement.

Three doctor appointments
in two days. All is good.
Then a Mediterranean salad
with black Quinoa and
dried tomatoes, a few pages
of the new mystery and a
noon-time nap as the weather
changes; the wind picks up;
the temperature drops; rain is
on the way. All is right for
sleep as he pushes back on the
recliner and draws a deep breath.
Next to him the chocolate lab
has circled and pawed his blanket
and already fallen fast asleep.
He listens to the dog’s soft
snore hoping there won’t be
thunder to scare the dog awake,
who will then hyperventilate
spoiling both naps.

The neighborhood association may cite us
for all around our beautiful,
beach cottage creation
is an ample amount of detritus —
aging leaves from last summer,
dead bugs’ brittle, disintegrating bodies,
a myriad of critters for biological studies,
weeds (wild flowers to us) in the ground’s natural storage
and, in spring, Morel mushrooms to forage.
We live in the sand behind a dune
along the shores of a big, freshwater, inland sea.
In front is a lovely, swaying,
landscape of dune grass
for everyone who passes to see.
In back, a pond and waterfall
and very tall pine trees.
Just a minute ago or perhaps just a few,
a neighbor had a maintenance crew,
seemingly without a care,
riding mowers from which flew,
in addition to debris,
global warming fumes into the air.
They cut the Kentucky Blue,
which later the crew,
with fume belching blowers, blew
cuttings into bags to be carted
off to a landfills
in the olfactory offending breeze.
The grass was cut to within
an inch above the black dirt
which had been carted in and tilled
then spread with a hoe
to cover the sand so
the invasive grass would grow
and quickly be ready to mow.
Twice a week this drama takes place
to manicure the space
and rigorously maintain
the perfect neighborhood domain.
But this is not suburbia, with
lifestyles lived less than wiser,
gumming up the air with lawnmower fumes
and water with fertilizers.
It could be one of the wild-and-woolly places,
a thriving, beautiful, beach community
with a lot of natural, deteriorating detritus
to replenish the earth,
even though our suburban neighbors
might still wish to cite us.

Because the dog is gentle,
He nudges the hands away
From his mistress. Hands
Had clapped together in faux
Anger near her back imitating
A soft slap. Then the dog sits
Next to the man who sits at
The computer. The dog’s
Mistress enters and gently
Scratches her husband’s back.
The dog gets up and nudges
Her hand away. Whether
Stopping pretend harm
Or a display of affection,
The dog monitors their
Behavior as if to say,
“She’s mine; he’s mine;
You’re both mine. Do you
Mind? “