Sing Out of F. Scott Key

For this Fourth of July holiday
no one's asking you

to quit blasting
at your drink-heavy
beachside barbecue

spiritedly patriotic Lee Greenwood
for helping "God
Bless the USA"

or Toby Keith
for being "Made in America"

or politically-neutral
isolationist chiller Jimmy Buffet

for lounging
away from it all
in "Margaritaville"

but along with those tunes

America-hating liberals everywhere
remind you to also play

"With A Little Help
From My Friends"

(either the Beatles'
or Joe Cocker's version is fine)

because after all
we're made independent

only through togetherness.

Thank you
for this brief
public service announcement.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

A Chronic State

On Thursday
North Carolina Governor
Pat McCrory

said he would sign
a bill into law
that will allow patients

who suffer
from intractable epilepsy

access to a point-three-percent
marijuana-based
treatment called cannabinol (CBD).

McCrory said
"This law will help
ease the suffering

endured by children
from whom
no other treatments

are effective
against their seizures."

Marijuana activists and advocates
point out
that this limited
CBD-only bill

may not be permissive enough
to help a lot of patients

but hey
it's a start

from the man
who back in February

drew 80,000 protesters
to the Moral March
on Raleigh

with a diverse array
of peeps asking him
and his pals

to stop seizing up
North Carolina's

voting rights
women's rights
environmental rights
educational rights

(to name a few)

and pretty much
to start doing right

and just like
mellow out
you know?

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

A Boehner Named Sue

(Apologies to Shel Silverstein and Johnny Cash)

Well it was Washington DC
at the end of June

and I was feeling a bit 
politically marooned

and I thought I'd stop
'fore I got introspective.

So right there standin'
on that gov'mint floor

I did what I'd never done before
and called out

"That dirty mangy Barack
done made me sue!"

Well I knew that this POTUS
had unilateral powers

and had passed policies
designed to make us cower.

I knew his unceasingly metered tone
and that calculating mind

behind a stubbornly stoic face.

He was taller'n me and slim
and calm and un-peachy toned

and I didn't
confront him in person
or talk on the phone

but I still said
in the comfort of that room

"I'm gonna sue.
How do you do?

Now I'm gonna cry."

I got all choked up
and the deal was done

and 'Rack rushed
to my feet and said
"You have won."
and that he

"came away
with a different point of view

and I never knew that's
what the song meant

but the GOP's right

so I promise to relent
and leave you
in charge forever."

If I ever have a son
just in case
he becomes Speaker

I think I'm gonna
call him Sue.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

A Controlled Arrogance

We're off to see the Wizard
the wonderful Wiz
Doctor Oz

because because
because because because

because he has an MD
and is a Professor of Surgery
at Columbia University

but uses his national platform
(to which he catapulted
with Oprah Winfrey's help

first appearing
on her show in 2004

then getting Harpo Productions'
backing for "The Dr. Oz Show"
in 2009)

to promote weight loss
wonder drugs.

We're off to see the Wizard
the wonderful Wiz
Doctor Oz.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Gonna Touch the Sky

Kanye West
has already failed

at both his husbandly
and professional duties.

Astronomers have discovered
a dwarf star so cool

that its carbon
has crystallized

giving the 11-billion-year-old
frustratingly elusive

celestial bauble
a dazzling diamond-like radiance

(which Kanye can neither
wrest from the sky
nor morphologically emulate)

when viewed by us
earth-bound mortals.

But don't worry

it will "let him finish"
whatever little project
he has going on right now.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

His Blended Family

Good news
for gays and les-byterians

The Holy Intermediary
Between Church and State

also known as
the top legislative body
of the Presbyterian Church USA

just voted to allow
their ministers
to preside over gay weddings

in states where
same-sex marriage is legal.

This follows
the decision
of the Episcopal Church in 2013

which follows
the decision
of the United Church of Christ
in 2005

which follows
the eleventh commandment
of God
in 4000 BCE

"Thou shalt not
impede the union
of a male and female

female and female
or male and male

so long as the couple
is not dressed
in polyester shirts or pants

because we're in
the middle of the desert
and I hate to see

my creations suffer."

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

His Holy Shame

According to a CNN caption
that was on-screen
for about thirty seconds

"Pope has gained
weight in office"
showing that even male leaders

with influence
over one billion people

are subject to unwarranted
body speculation
if only briefly

so leave Francis alone.

Besides it being none
of our business anyway

for all we know
(and there's a lot
that's surprised us already
about the Pontifex)

he may also be incubating
the Second Coming of Christ
and we must show Him

that this world
for all its troubles

is in fact
a nice one.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Impeachable Offense

Fox News
if your well
has run dry

feel free to quote
the following.

The only time
which Democrats
progressives and just liberals
in general

feel happy to be citizens
of our country

is when we win 2 to 1
(and what kind of tiny
winning score is that?)
at a sport

invented in Europe
and played internationally

which we don't
even call "soccer"
but rather "football"

against citizens
of a country
just a 4,000-mile

hop skip and a jump
away from our
beloved president's homeland

(assuming being a "birther"
is still cool
this late into Obama's
second term).

Because there
is no such thing
as a soccer-loving Republican.

So with your flair
for creative reporting

with these above facts
as a solid foundation

this could be
an absolutely scandalous story
that unseats all Democrats
in Congress

and makes Obama retire
in sudden embarrassment
"due to unrelated issues".

Maybe call it
"soccer Benghazi"?

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Method to His Manliness

Behind every great man
is a great woman

the saying goes
(and of course women
know how to lead
from the front)

but behind him
should also be the man
who is good

who can call out
the bad behavior
he senses is coming

who can risk
having the general
disown him

because he's
used his own strength
his own status

to defend the concept
of community

in the world
in the nation
in the household.

He knows
he can be a father
he can be a brother
(blood or not)

while supporting
his mothers and sisters

and he knows
that this is what it means
to be a man.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Not Ashamed to Admit

Now granting the fact
that expressions
of explicit homophobia

have only relatively recently
started to become "gauche"
in mainstream American opinion

and "gauche" means "left"

and Texas Governor Rick Perry
was just one in a line

of perfectly solid
and erudite conservative challengers
vying for President in 2012

maybe he really did think

that the case
for gay reparative therapy
because of its striking similarities

to rehab
for people with alcoholism

(how did Democrats
never notice this?)

was a compassionate and sensitive
topic on which to expound

in San Francisco.

He acknowledged
a bold-by-GOP-standards

fact that homosexuality
may have
a genetic component

leaving hope for the possibility
that his and others'

simultaneously self-serving
and self-defeating lifestyle
of petty and obstructionist

and downright harmful
Obama-one-upmanship

can one day be cured

(or at least
have its symptoms
kept in check).

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Brat-Worst Case Scenario

Conservative Republican
members of Congress
have feelings too.

If there were a time
to feel sorry for Eric Cantor
this is it.

On Tuesday
the second-most-senior
Republican in the House

was beaten
in the primary

by Tea Party professor
(any double-takes
are most certainly forgivable)

Dave Brat
who teaches economics

at Randolph-Macon College
in Ashland Virginia.

His fancy book-knowledge
certainly came into play
in his campaign

having been both fiscally
and socially shrewd enough

to win over constituents
by spending only
$122,000 on advertising

compared with Cantor's $1 million.

We will see
if Brat lives up to his name
in his actions

more so than Cantor

who not even once
ever united the House
through the healing power

of sacred Jewish song
(what a shame).

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Surveying the Century

With the concurrence
of bad food
an at-risk natural world
and modern medicine

today it's fashionable
to want a satisfying
healthy life

rather than one
that is merely long.

Probably a positive trend overall
in terms of self-
and other-awareness.

but yesterday the oldest man
in the world
111-year-old
New Yorker Alexander Imich

died after evading
the Nazis in Poland

learning five languages
getting a Zoology degree

and writing books.

He was once asked
how he lived so long

and answered
"I don't know.
I simply didn't die earlier."

He did take physical care
of himself
by eating well
and exercising

but there's something to be said
for sticking around
with a slightly beat-up machine

doing what you can with it
but also

just being around to see.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Tracy Morgan Bona Fide

Tracy Morgan was injured
in a six-car pileup

and is now
in critical condition.

Having a net worth
of 18 million dollars

a playful and robust
sense of humor

the ability to bounce back
from ill-thought-out comments

having the inimitable
"hot lady nerd
from next door" Tina Fey
as a fake and real boss

and even a close
supportive family
with whom to share it all

will pull you a long way
from pain
but not all the way.

Please recover soon
Tracy Morgan

and please show
that you are invincible.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Not Just on the Day

For tomorrow
this 70th anniversary
of D-Day

you don't have
to be pro-war

or think America
has been blameless
in every global 
(or domestic) conflict

to respect
and listen to
the soldiers
who gave their lives

and yes they still gave

even if they were
lucky enough

to come
back home to us.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Training Up A Child

While it's true
that if Hitler hadn't done

all that
orchestrating-mass-murder stuff
he'd be more widely-regarded

as a hero today
for first lifting
millions of Germans
out of poverty

it's still ill-advised
to quote him

(and even Gandhi
had a few questionable views

though he did stick to
that whole "deliberately avoiding
senseless violence" thing

which certainly
helped his image)

and probably most especially

if you're running
a Christian children's ministry
in Alabama

that aims to help
impoverished kids

even if that quote says

"He alone
who owns the youth
gains the future."

Luckily they did
recognize their mistake
after three days

but they probably
need a better
outdoor advertising publicist.

Even "Hussein" Obama
is probably a better
more moral person

from whom to pluck
an inspirational quote.

(The Son of God
may be everywhere

but frankly
after two thousand years
he's tired of doing ad copy.)

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.

Used to Be a Time

At the three-day
Republican Leadership Conference

the Republican National Chairman
Reince Priebus asked

"Why does the party 
of Abraham Lincoln

not get more credit
as the party of tolerance?"

Lest we forget
Lincoln's calculating pragmatism
that conveniently brought down

the institution of human ownership
in the process

it's still true that those
who cannot remember

the past of thirty years
fifteen years
six years
or even six days ago

are condemned to repeat it

and those that have never listened
to Janet Jackson's 1986 hit

"What Have You Done
for Me Lately?"

are doomed to hear
a larger and larger proportion
of society

blast the infectiously
forboding tune
and leave the Old Party.

(It was Grand
while it lasted.)

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.