Surviving the Venal

Surviving the Venal by Odin Roark As we peer into the future As far as we dare see There glides effortlessly down entitlement throats The six o’clock cocktails of gin and vodka While cups of water appease Shrunken stomachs in desperation As after dinner snifters of brandy Flame amidst knavish whispers of next-day scheming Prosperity’s throw-aways Boil tea above dwindling Sterno Identity’s loss struggles to stay warm Evenings of silk and down covered comfort Remain the usual As cardboard insulation is adjusted Making another night doable For the other kind of usual Tomorrow’s few who can make a difference Seldom venture past their pitiful hubris Their custom suits and handmade shoes Grabbing news hour attention While the needy languish Through another empty-dish dinner hour So goes Washington’s plague of indifference That place where Diseases are but for profit Reality’s ravenous-cries fall on deaf ears And legislative conscience continues making gestures Wanting us to believe they’re human Food stamps for subsistence May never visit the Hill’s automatons of human representation Yet we can hope that another kind of hunger for survival Will ravage their psyche Come re-election time