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Political Poetry: The Drug War |
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Politics isn’t all about newspapers, pundits, and TV cameras. The interaction between politics and culture is as rich and fascinating as the history and news items we discuss here at The Seminal on a daily basis. Political thought and criticism has a history of being wrapped in cultural and artistic trappings, from Orwell’s 1984 to Rage Against The Machine’s “Take The Power Back.” In that spirit, we present you with a new, and what we hope will become regular, feature in which we highlight original political poetry as a jumping off point for cultural and political discussion.
We hope you enjoy it, after the jump…
America’s War
by Eugene Carmen
They come to me as runaways from home,
I make them feel not alone,
With one needle I put their minds at ease,
If they are a female I can do what I please,
After that first high, they’ve gotta have more,
They come to depend on me, these are the kind of people I adore,
I’ve got your son stealing for me,
I’ve made them blind, they can’t see,
I’ve got your daughter working the streets,
Your daughter best serves me between the sheets,
Thank you government for turning a blind eye,
For those senators, governors and congressmen who all get high,
Bill Clinton who didn’t inhale,
For voters who allowed him a second term as well,
I have and never will use drugs myself,
I love my money and am conscious about my health.
Copyright ©2007 Eugene Leroy Carmen
Comments, more political poetry, and thoughts are appreciated. If you would like to contribute to this feature, please feel free to email us with your work at seminal@theseminal.com
Eugene Carmen was born in Sioux City, IA on August 30th, 1965. He graduated from North High School in 1983 and then joined the U.S. Navy, having a love affair for the open seas for 20 years. He retired from the Navy in 2003 and has a wonderful wife of 14 years and a son who just tuned 13. He currently lives with his family in Ridgeville, SC and he is employed as an Army Contractor. He enjoys poetry, lyrics, short stories, novels and screenplays, of which he has one finished and another in the works.
You can thank prohibition for giving gangsters and perverts the ability to prosper by giving them full control of the drug market.
Drugs are the biggest industry in the world and we have weirdos (like in your poem) controlling the market and exploiting its buyers.
A controlled and regulated market with accurate and responsible education can change this. Attack the drug problem as a social health issue and find out why people want to use drugs. If half of the Drug Czars budget was spent on the schools of our nation instead of these ridiculous ads there would be less teens that turn to drugs.
Carmen’s poem is good … and here is one in the same vein, though looking at the issue through the other side of the mirror:
Drug War Rapists
They bus in young men and women, yanked by SWAT teams from home
I lock them in cells — almost never alone
Once the mandatory minimum sentences have thown away the keys,
armed with a truncheon, I club the backs of their knees.
In the dark of the night, new ones are forced to be whores,
deaf to their whimpers … I step past their doors.
Your son’s working for me, in that crowd in the sanctum
He’s surrounded … beat down … and he bleeds from his rectum.
I’ve got your sister alone too, separate from the others
trading sex with me for visits through glass with your mother.
Thank your government well — they turn a blind eye
those self-serving politicians, who let these things fly.
But they serve me well too, because they keep me employed:
an endless stream of drug war prisoners — fresh flesh to enjoy.
I like it Mojo, and both sides of the story deserve to be told, both in prose and in poetry. Here’s another one, though not my own writing:
by Inspector Deck/Wu-Tang Clan, C.R.E.A.M.
(by the way, if you’re interested in contributing your poetry to this political poetry feature, hit me up via the email address above.)
Summing up ‘08 in 17 syllables - PoliticalHaiku.com
Its early to guess
but I think ‘08 will show
politics are fun
Nice haiku!
Im 15 and im already being exposed to the horror of this country of ours. here is a true out of the blue poem from a complete genius in my case!!!
edge of the empire
___________
i am so tired
of the seperating fabric in
over-worn clothes,
the holes in the socks
shot straight through my shoes,
the empathetic nerve-wringing
tireless repetition
of trying to save
the world while
you worry about what
outfit
you’ll be wearing to its
funeral
hope
is the only genre that i
fit into
these days
and i wish i could
sleep
with a live-feed microphone
plugged in
to the world
so that all of the
pointless hate
could find balance from my
conscience
i wish we didn’t
bomb ourselves
and blame it on _____,
and i wish the lies weren’t bought
because of dark melatonin and
for once we didn’t eat up
every rotten scrap offered
i am sick of your collogen,
sick of your news,
sick of your sex drive and
knee-jerk distractions,
your everyday bullshit
of “they did it first” while
you excuse the true villians with
tounge-in-cheek apathy
i am sick of having my reality
handed to me by the networks and
i’d scream my face blue if
you weren’t so scared of color
we’re sifting through the stains of
“it’s okay to hate china” and
“your god is wrong and this
bullet
can prove it…”
does it really shock you
all that much
that in absence of popularity
for hating our own colors
we crossed a few oceans
to dig up new scapegoats?
america, you’re full of shit.
america, your clean white
stripes have
begun to blush red.
america? hang your
childish head in
shame.