We drove blind a hundred miles 
through primeval old-growth forest,
the ground piled with eons 
of fallen cones and needle clusters, 
red squirrels chatter, chickadee jubilation
woodpecker nests, insect divination 
but just out of sight
scarcely a stone’s throw away
beyond the tangled underbrush was
desolation as far as the eye could see,
denuded bare brown rolling hills, 
clear-cut stump devastation.

View corridors.

I saw it on TV
a new plastic garbage bag
preserving our mountains from pollution,
an offshore oil company
saving our fisheries from dissolution,
the vice squad
saving our girls from destitution
diet soda
leading the social revolution.

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Vote for me, change the world,
but when all the confetti and streamers 
were swept off all the Supreme Court dockets,  
I saw him peeking from under a party hat
from inside somebody's back pocket. 

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We smiled across the party lights 
moody drinks softened all the edges
she told me all about delights 
and invited me to see
the entries in her nightly ledgers,
but how was I to know 
as she floated like a dream
that all of her exotic treasures 
were haunted by her primal screams?

View corridors.