Poems

The Hopeless Radical, a poem

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

A fearful night,

and a burned bridge freshly smolders.

Such is the life of a hopeless radical.

Less sexy than a hopeless romantic,

but more useful than a hopeless idealist.

Two are ideal hands of the state,

whose hands when pressed against us

create our struggle.

Our struggle,

Our political struggle.

The hopeless radical knows

that identity is not solidarity,

and logic cannot fixate on rhetoric.

The pressing hands,

They ignite and explode gaslights

To burn and humiliate us.

This is the life of the hopeless radical,

Of the unbowed optimist.

The state, the struggle,

The hands against us,

And our rhetorical traditions.

This is our life,

The life of the unbowed,

of the unbroken,

of the hopeless radical.

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Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda – A poem for a dying planet

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

Would have,

Could have,

Should have.

These words which only pay lip service

to memory and potential

and attribute cause to regret

Serve no purpose but to hinder us

As our world decays.

We owe it to ourselves,

To our living legacies still too young to fend for themselves,

We owe it to them to act.

To organize and hope.

Two words to embody and elevate,

While we smash the banks of marble,

And pine for the fjords of freedom.

Would have,

Could have,

Should have.

Nay.

Will have.

Can have.

Shall have.

Cruel Reality, a poem for our times

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

Cruel Reality

A classic song screams out through my radio,

“We won’t get fooled again!”

Unless we don’t pay attention in history class,

Or worse, when we don’t bother to ask any questions.

Yet soft,

Do not let your words enable “deconstruction.”

Fight on weirdos, fight on freaks,

Fight on.

Stanza 2, the part where the poet keeps rambling,

Not this time.

My poems are no longer mine,

No longer for me,

No longer needing to be justified or validated.

Poetry itself is justified.

Does the president get it?

Of course not,

Evil is as evil does.

Evil has no humanity,

Do not appeal to where there is no court.

Why do so many legitimize evil

by doing nothing?

Denial, easy to do

when ICE or the B.I.A isn’t kidnapping your child

and beating up your grandmother.

Brainless professional bootlicks

and we give them badges and parades.

If they failed at high school football

why trust them with the law?

Cruel reality, not everyone is on your side.

Cruel reality, our lenses can be skewed

and skew our view.

Cruel reality, people are not always what they seem.

I could go on for days about this world’s cruel reality.

And I will.

I need to.

Cruel reality, an idea is an idea in of itself.

It’s all inane, but it’s all very interesting to.

Both?

Yes, and neither.

Confused yet?

Good. That’s step one.

The next is controlling

channelling

the inevitable frustrations.

Your microwave will kill you

faster than a diseased box

and the cops are bloodthirsty.

Long live reality T.V.

Max Headroom was no metaphor,

Tangent words begin again

reps and senators

Hot sex live 24/7

And the millionaires whine more about it than we do.

That’s nice but please sir,

Please master,

May I have some more?

No, well, can I have my life back?

No?

Can I at least live?

No.

Why are the puppies begging eyes

only effective when they are blue,

not brown?

Enjoy cable?

iPhones? Wifi?

And all the other masturbation aides?

Well, congrats jerks,

While you were hate tweeting about whatever it is,

Tyrone got shot,

Maria was deported,

And Mohamed is stuck in LAX.

Good luck replacing all three.

Flags make good cum catchers,

And even our soldiers are tired of being props,

Sick of being human flag poles.

Don’t use the used to justify you.

Facts to suit theories not theories to suit facts.

Have I limited myself?

Is grammar so important?

What do order and style

have anything to do with truth?

When did “MAGA” become “Zig HEIL!”?

It always was.

A big, round planet

that no empire could ever keep covered.

Caligula had to come sometime

but a horse in the senate would be fitting

since it is already full of jackasses.

Thank you good night!

You’ve been a great crowd!

Don’t forget to harass the waitress on your way out.

Cruel reality,

Integrity can fall short,

And supremacy hinders the so called “supreme.”

Cruel reality,

Proustian memories triggered not by a cookie, but a beer,

A familiar scene, my local pub and brew.

A dad trying,

A bored teen,

A hungry young sister,

Convinced she “isn’t hungry daddy!”

It is her standing rock, she will not be moved.

A sweet scene, tainted by the world it exists in.

Cruel reality,

Not everyone on the same side

is actually on the same side.

Cruel reality,

One man can destroy democracy.

One can always interfere,

But one can never stand in the way of truth.

Cruel reality for them,

The truth is always there,

And will always haunt them.

Cruel reality,

We can never be free from the haunt of memory.

Nation captive to nation,

The profit in pain.

Cruel reality,

Kids don’t care about the carbon-dated world

of colas and silver screen stars.

Should they?

A question for the philosophers, not the poets.

Cruel reality for the enemy,

Is that the game is a state of mind.

But the game ain’t saying nothing.

Today the masses say it,

Cruel reality for the enemy,

The eye of integrity,

Karma and big brother

Are on them like never before.

Cruel reality for the enemy, but we all got game.

Cruel reality, what is happening here

Is perfectly clear

And it always has been.

Cruel reality,

Racism is not just for the racists,

But even the “good” people.

Cruel reality for me,

Though frustration is real

The tedium of this world,

The pain and suffering

Is more real than ever today.

Cruel reality, that isn’t too cruel when you think about it,

But the time, the chance, to step back,

And give others a space, a time, a home.

Cruel reality, pretty blond pornstars

Have gone political,

And trust me when I say

It isn’t pretty.

Cruel reality.

Cruel reality.

Cruel reality.

Won’t someone pass me a pill

Since joints are a sin?

Pass me a pill so that I may sink

So that I can forget

So that I can ignore these days,

This era,

So that I can ignore

our cruel reality.

The Artist Is The Revolutionary

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

The Artist as the Revolutionary

Art for art’s sake

was the most selfish and lazy philosophy

ever defended.

Art for art’s sake,

is lazy.

Art is an available tactic,

a potential means to the ends

of revolution.

Art that only exists for itself

is selfish.

Art is a means,

a means of production,

and all means,

all tactics,

all resources

belong to the people

not the patrons.

Pretty pictures,

edgy statues,

all meaningless

when it’s expression just for expression’s sake.

I do not scorn the schools of art,

I simply point out truth,

as all artists should.

The personal is political

and art, good art at least, is very personal.

Art must be, nay, Art is,

more than an outlet,

it is a tool,

escapist art is a distraction.

The artist,

The visionary,

The revolutionary,

has a duty to their public.

Art is revolutionary

and so should be the artist.

The Poet as The Revolutionary

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

The Poet as the Revolutionary

The poet as a revolutionary

is an all too common trope.

So what happened?

Where did they all go?

Where are the poets and lyrics

and bards who can spark the imagination

of a generation

to end the segregation

and the era of hate.

The poet as revolutionary,

A common but missing motif,

We have minds running for office

all of a generation inspired.

So dare does a poet

question their purpose?

Even now,

Even in a time of awakening,

Where conscious privilege cannot be forsaken?

The poet as revolutionary,

and the leaderless movement of leaders.

Poetry has its politics,

its stake,

its place in the revolution

and it always will.

The poet as revolutionary,

the romantics

and the voices of their days.

We, a socialist poem

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

We make the profits.

We starve.

We make the wealth.

We starve.

We make you rich.

We starve.

We are promised rewards.

We starve.

We are isolated.

We starve.

We march.

We are fed.

We rally.

We are fed.

We have the guillotine.

We win.

3/15/19

False Flags, a socialist poem

/ James J Jackson Jr / Leave a comment

False flags,

Do they wrap the coffins of martyrs in fake news?

Dying children,

Pipe bombs and alienated labor,

all because of misinformation.

Get help or get a gun

but only turn it on yourself.

Life is not black and white

but our options sure are.

The literary gatekeepers say they want “edge.”

They want the “best.”

Yet all we read is fluff pieces

about some racist grandma yelling in her office.

And some shlock about a garden with a friendly bumble bee.

When you remember that bees are dying, the poem loses heart.

False flags,

Killing children,

Winning the presidency.

Such are the times we live in,

Such will the time be

Where our children die.