David X Novak
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The Vanity of Verse

10/21/2018

 

When criminals assume the helm
Where else can you expect the realm
    To go?
Disasters come to overwhelm,
With innocents in coffin’d elm
    Lain so.

Civilians voted for a man
Whom all agreed a charlatan
    Regardless—  
Put honesty in the trash can
And virtue, viced by the ruffian,
    Left bardless.

How shall we sing of former days
And is there any left to praise?
    This nation
Ignored warnings of a “malaise”
And sunk its credit in foul play’s
    Temptation.

America, land of the free,
Became land of dishonesty
    And seizes
Spasmodically for all to see
Frothing and sputtering rabidly
    For Jesus.

America goes to the dust;
Let history’s verdict linger just.
    We sing
How people their inherited trust
Hellward, with joy and scant nonplussed,
    Did fling.

Vice triumphed over virtue and
The truth became a contraband
    In essence;
With discord sown and scandal fanned
The conflagration out of hand
    Nor lessens.

So with a whimper we subside,
As greatness ebbs just like the tide:
    Vainglory
Remains the substance; men abide
And tell themselves with foolish pride
    Their story.


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