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Open Poetry #49
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JerryPat2
Member Laureate
since 2011-02-06
Posts 16975
South Louisiana

0 posted 2016-08-06 03:01 PM


oh boy
this is a hard one
it was true that the hate I lived with
drew a certain kind of line in those days
so I’m gritting my teeth
attempting to put that young
troubled man
smack dab
in today’s mean streets
what kind of line would my hate have drawn?
yes, back then I drew a line
but it was a line I wasn’t
even completely conscious of
I just knew not to allow people
to cross it
the mean streets of today
would be so different than they
were back then
but mean streets are mean streets
you adjust to them or die
if I were walking down them
with the same deep rage
as I had back then
would I “bellow” about revolution?
I am trying very hard to
go there
to put myself
in the shoes of that angry young man
in the mean streets of today
it is hard to finesse
still I would like to believe
my rage and my political bent
would be
same as today

here is the deal
for two decades I never had a
political thought
didn’t have a computer
where I could find people who thought
the same as I
the street people I came across
did not have political conversations
in other words I had not one
political thought those days
I had enough problems just staying alive
you have given me a hard task, Lori
but I can say
I have always been conservative
even if I didn’t know what
it meant
so! my rage as an angry young man
would hate what America
had become
and I would fight to the end
to stop the direction
we are headed in
revolution?
if it came to that to put a stop to the madness
because giving in to the madness
is madness itself

you gave me a very difficult
subject to consider, Lori

©August 6, 2016 / Jerry Pat Bolton


~ If they give you ruled paper, write sideways. ~

[This message has been edited by JerryPat2 (08-06-2016 03:50 PM).]

© Copyright 2016 Jerry Pat Bolton - All Rights Reserved
Redstart
Senior Member
since 2014-05-16
Posts 535

1 posted 2016-08-06 03:12 PM


If a man can reply so quickly and so honestly...he's a man. Doubts? We all have.
Lori Grosser Rhoden
Member Patricius
since 2009-10-10
Posts 10202
Fair to middlin' of nowhere
2 posted 2016-08-06 03:16 PM


Thanks for the great response! If you happen to mull it over further feel free to write more. ~L

JerryPat2
Member Laureate
since 2011-02-06
Posts 16975
South Louisiana
3 posted 2016-08-06 03:22 PM


Ahhh . . . Thank you Redstart. Appreciate you kind thoughts.

~ If they give you ruled paper, write sideways. ~

JerryPat2
Member Laureate
since 2011-02-06
Posts 16975
South Louisiana
4 posted 2016-08-06 03:24 PM


I will mull it over, Lori, and I know how you would like for my mulling to come up with something different than I just gave you. It's possible . . . Maybe.

~ If they give you ruled paper, write sideways. ~

Lori Grosser Rhoden
Member Patricius
since 2009-10-10
Posts 10202
Fair to middlin' of nowhere
5 posted 2016-08-06 03:49 PM


no, not a different conclusion at all. You are the best person I know that can relate to some of the young people of today. In your day you didn't have the radical influences of today. Make sense?
JerryPat2
Member Laureate
since 2011-02-06
Posts 16975
South Louisiana
6 posted 2016-08-06 03:52 PM


Oh my, Lori, thank you for the compliment, and you are so right, we didn't have the radical influences which are prevalent these days. I'll be mulling . . .

~ If they give you ruled paper, write sideways. ~

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