George Wallace
IMMIGRATION SONG
I wish jesus was an american
I wish beer was free
I wish immigration agents
would leave us alone
no ICE at the back door
no ICE in the bathroom mirror
no ICE in the manger
no red-hatted president
who should go fuck himself
in his little florida money mansion
i wish the informers would stop informing
i wish america would let americans be
leave it to those of us
who earn our big big pay
in the home of the free
land of the minimum wage
no lettuce fields rotted
no automotive death factories
no rusting out in the rain
i wish jesus was real
I wish jesus was american
i wish the kitchens
and the grub holes
and the grocery aisles
and pick up trucks
and pimps and johns
and seafood depots
and gasoline pumps
would open their arms
like they open up
their wallets and
their big fat mouths
and take us all in
not swallow us whole
and spit us out;
no bad neighbor
no deportation jet
no bible thumping bureaucrat
no ice agent over my left shoulder
or cop car to get in the way
no children lying on cold concrete
in a detention center
lonely angry dark afraid
I wish jesus was american
i wish jesus was real
i wish freedom was
an ocean of brotherhood
that would cradle you and me,
wash all the hate away
EMPTY HANDED
They thought they had caught her
They thought they had cornered her
The unfit ones, the intruders,
They thought they had isolated
The source of their pain,
Big witch in a little bottle,
Better than them;
They thought
they had captured
lightning from the boot black sky
In their insolence
and malevolent pride
and could rob her
of the power
she held over every damn
one of them;
Turn the tables
On the table-turner
Obliterate the obliterator,
Drag the unattainable one
Who they could not possess
From their sight
With their empty handedness
And their thirst for mastery
Over things that
Did not belong
To them,
Unmanned them,
Things forbidden them,
And wash from their mouths
The terrible dust from which she came;
They thought they could mask
Their weaknesses, deny those
Necessary imperfections
Which made them
Perfectly human,
And stand big
And terrifying
As mountains over
A wildness they
Could never tame --
Little gods made flesh --
And make her plead
For mercy, and
Punish her
Beyond
Primal sanity,
Plow her
Back into the
Holy soil;
For making them
Go so crazy,
For making them
Bleed from the heart
So bad, when night
Came round and
Turned them back
Into the frightened children
They truly were.
STRANGER IN A STRANGE CITY
He had a strange and peaceful heart, with no evil in it, a young heart, until he traveled to cities,
strange transparent cities, cities paved with noose and nail and tithing stone; cities of men with
delicate mouths, sad boulevards, shop windows and endless empty-eyed naked mannequins;
cities of shop clerks and pigeons in doorways, and snakes in manhole covers with steam rising
out of every one of them; he had a peaceful heart, until he fell for the florists and frauds and
fornicators, and for the many tall women with unapproachable eyes and lapdogs in their arms;
he became a creature of cities, habitue of small cafes and hotel rooftops; wild cities, abandoned
cities, holy cities of shattered window glass, and widows locked away in armchair walk-up
apartments; cities waiting to be discovered or seeking a way out; cities of leaned-upon
husbands and the lovers who leaned on them; every city really; this city, that wears its chains loosely,
that city, with men who wear beards and go down to the racetrack and laugh out loud, louder than
loud, against the emptiness that surrounds them;
city of tongue and cheek, city of scuffle and run, city of casual violence and fear and faith in
money, and dwarfed cathedrals that gleam like glass and steel; city of hearts that lie buried like
something dead;
he became companion to false companions and nervous men, played guitars with missing
strings; confidante to gaunt drinkers in raw bars with nothing left in their tubercular lungs but
spit; and he survived, in cities built and bombed and bombed and built, in cities which rose up
on their old broken haunches, and cursed the enemy and the stranger at the door; and he built
back up and torched the sky again and again;
and there he passed his days, in cities of plague and poverty, cities of rats and railways; cities of
survivors on every corner, waiting for the light to change; and priests and prostitutes, bank
tellers and money wranglers, and jazzed up gamblers three to a cab; and cabbies in their cabbie
hats, and pretty boys smoking perfumed cigarettes and waiting outside the opera house for the
old gentlemen who brought them there;
he became one of them, brittle to the core, yet soft somehow; profit taker, bohemian, orphan in
the snow, hobo poet among poets who reinvent themselves in the little winding streets where
certain men go at night in search of love; and he sang his poems -- like lovers' laments, like
dollar-a-dance, like enormous roses which hide the anguish of the infinite -- until there was no
more peace left in his heart, only the city;
an enormous mistake, nearly famous;
the dada anarchist who runs down the street, thinking he can shoot holes in the night sky and
does so, effortlessly enough, and then climbs through one of them, unexpectedly, and finds his
way home to paradise.
THE TROUBLE IS FREEDOM
The trouble is freedom slips through the forest of thick and unquiet souls, dark and wooden, and
sets them chiming;
wields machetes, severs chains, jams the machinery, upsets the old tiger and sets him prowling.
the trouble is freedom plants its rebellious feet down on a subway platform or sits on a park
bench under a no busking sign, pulls out a flute or guitar, and starts singing;
rumors and songs of liberation, truths last heard on windswept caribbean mountaintops
and tropical shores.
freedom speaks a language that grows among the people, in an accent no power can tame or
control, accents heard in secret cafes among people who selflessly refuse to obey.
among all the motion and profit taking and bayonets and pride, and nations passing blindly by,
shoulder to shoulder, the trouble is freedom, and those in whose eyes it unexpectedly shines;
eyes like silver dollars in a sea of dead copper pennies; the only real currency, antique,
enormous, sonorous, grave.
with just the right motion you could strike one against granite and produce flame.
with just the right motion you could skip one across a river, like a flying fish with silver wings in
the newly minted sun, and sink a battleship.
INJUSTICE SPEAKS SOFTLY
Injustice is rich folk dining on white tablecloths while poor people clean up the kitchen and carry
the trays. Injustice is the rich sitting at a separate table, dishing out the wealth of nations in
unjust proportion. We are all working hard, but some are working harder than others, and
nothing to show for it except being left out in the cold.
A cat left out in the cold will burgle for its pay, while the rich get richer, fatter and more afraid.
Injustice speaks softly, it has no need to carry a big stick. Injustice is performative: consider the
government official wearing a flak jacket and giving interviews while hauling off the poor in grand
display. When injustice gets caught with its hands in the cookie jar, it blames the poor.
For a nation to prosper, the government must admit its mistakes out loud. For a nation to
prosper, the government must not stiff the waiter. For a nation to prosper, the rich must not rule
the land. They must learn to rule themselves, giving a fair portion of their power away.
Then there can be justice in the land. Then there can be the possibility of peace.
Peace, as in sweet summer rain.
Peace, as in snow piling up on suburban lawns and tenement walls, faster than money
