Exceptionist Just Desserts

You drove in air-conditioned comfort on even the shortest of unnecessary errands

The toilet in your tiny nursing home room has become an impossible destination

You lamented that the big box chinese stores were all so far away

Now you are so lucky with a super WalMart right next to your house

You ate as much as you wanted of all the wrong foods for too many years

Finished that up without any insurance for your multiple medical conditions

The brave accomplished your mission and you had a great photo op

But the media conspirators followed that up with cruel ongoing coverage of the thousands of dead

It was so hard back then without any fast food drive-thru places

Now I can grab a quik lunch to eat in the car on my way to my next showing

You re-financed and took equity for great vacations on your credit card

Your house is worth less than you owe but your payments keep going up

You kept rolling newer cars into more expensive leases just to drive to work

Laid off and unemployable it’s funny how you can’t even sell that POS

You often wondered why your mother was bitter and angry on your visits

Now you sit in a drugged silence between institutional meals with soap operas droning

You kept your waterfront lawn green with fertilizers and pesticides

You were outraged as the fish all died when the poisoned water turned into algae soup

You put your complete faith and trust in private dialog with your personal savior

You thought you ascended safely to heaven, never glimpsing the empty truth

You spent hundreds monthly on creams, supplements and rejuvenators

Fashionistas take your foolish measure with half a glance then simply ignore you

You always carried plastic-bottled water to stay hydrated as you drove around

Their factory was not far below where others were releasing your half-treated wastes

You deftly combined stress, overeating, drinking and inactivity for years

Now they turn you carefully twice a day like some fat and overcooked bratwurst

You drank yourself into a stupor upon every possible occasion

All of that lost time now just makes your too-brief life seem even shorter

You stuck to mouthing the core values of voters targeted by your financial backers

Gridlock, bad planning, fiscal immaturity and arrogance is your legacy

Your knowledge of sports and entertainment was both wide and deep

It dispassionately evaporated like the water in your tissues upon your demise

You smirked and shook your head over those ignorant, poverty-stricken lands

Now your boomerang children hear they have steady jobs, good housing and even buy new cars

You met your retirement head on just like all the challenges you had faced

You collapsed on the 5^th fairway in a lime green shirt and funny white shoes after 8 months

You leveraged a second home for family gatherings in some toney region

You visited maybe three times and they sold it off just as soon as you died

You felt safe in your monster truck the size of a Russian family apartment

You hurt your knee because it was unsuitable for carrying a few groceries

You made your own rules with guns, knives, fists and your powerful muscles

You finally took your own life soaking in your stale and smelly piss in a wheelchair

You were aggressively noisy, proudly ignorant and fiercely independent

Your back and your hemorrhoids brought you to welfare and Medicaid

You ate nothing but pre-prepared corporate food, often for days at a time

Now you live large under the hot lights of the earlybird cafeteria specials

You sold your vote to the most attractively packaged puppet that was dangled

You’re angry at somebody because your debt just grows and the job you just lost was shit

Cheap illegales worked quietly inside and outside of your oversized trophy home

Now their foreign tongue is everywhere and they vow to re-take your land

You blew off school and took up some now-forgotten extreme sport and old video games

Now you think maybe some kind of sales job might just work for you

You bravely rode looking tough without a helmet and your lip curled up in a Harley sneer

You breathe, eat, shit and piss through tubes and you can’t move a single muscle

You gave in to their every whim in hopes that they would always be your friends

They lay near half-eaten snacks on your couch greasy, tattooed and pierced

You got a good job cutting down the old forest and said, well, fuck them tourists, anyway

Now the big trees are all gone and no visitors ever come and you have no job

You followed leaders who relied on faith in god tempered with a studied ignorance

Their colossal blunders have sacrificed your future and forfeited your morality

Just A Small Turtle

From "The Lives of the Reptilian Saints"

I saw a small box turtle

          next to the roadway,

emerging from the bushes

           he stuck out his neck

And the commuter traffic roared by

           not slowing down a bit

Just a small turtle, all alone on his way,

          why must he cross? What does he seek?

As humans fly by, encased in their cars, as he in his shell

          millions of years of survival never trained him for this

He ducks in his head at the massive vibration of a semi

          Its wheels rumble close and a dark shadow blasts overhead

Without a movement he feels hidden upon the yellow centerline

          Then cautiously extends just the tip of his nose

Women pass by too closely, oblivious on their cellphones

          Brave men in pickups consider swerving over top this little thing

Many minutes pass until he reaches the very crown of the highway

          Just a small turtle with a very short life, and certainly no soul

I barely recognize him as I pass by lost in my AM fog

          But somewhere inside me his small struggle evokes a long-lost pathos

I keep on driving but my thoughts focus and remain

          I slow down and turn round to return and help him cross

My thoughts are lifted, for once, on the way to some lackluster work

          Perhaps one small deed can really begin a larger change

Only a moment too late do I return to the scene

          For though not yet dried, he has re-entered the eternal void

Just one very small turtle crossing our busy highway

          Just one more small accident on the road to my personal perdition.

Finally, Really Out Of Time

When you realize that you may be almost out of time

          Things swim into focus that you know now you never really noticed

The preciousness of the dullest moments you once ignored

          Become quite apparent as you are led off to be rewarded

A series of  last times and silent goodbyes lead to new conclusions

          And things as they are molt into merest memories for you

And though voices call out as you are peeled away

          The path you must take only leads you further and further astray

Then there are those few brief moments so inexplicable and sweet

          And you try to pause within them but they vanish like the dew

And if one finally realizes the very preciousness of the ordinary

          The busy world goes on around, quite unfairly, without a second thought

When at last perched on the brink of that chasm our thoughts can never fill

          Slowly grows an awareness of that awaiting unknown, so dark and so very still

Colors seem somehow brighter, familiar voices ring much more dear

          Though they don’t yet see it as clearly, their time is also very near

There is no more daily rush to nowhere then back again every night

          And now there is this fearful separation from the herd that you must fight

The burden of increasing uselessness grows heavy and confounding

          Food and drink can be tasteless with no real life to surround them

Memories boil up from places far away and all those times that did not last

          It becomes easy to imagine a hidden goodness in the distant past

Opportunities squandered and chances not taken return to haunt

          things you took for granted all those years re-appear just to taunt

Some come to sell you jesus, some come to relieve you of your assets

          The drugs remove your fight but still you lie awake in the night

Chance events from childhood on, strive to weave a full quilt of meaning

          Feverishly your mind keeps seeking some pattern before your leaving

The little ones are brought by to stand in wide-eyed apprehension

          friends and cousins may briefly pause and ask themselves a question

Some perish in a fiery instant, some linger painfully and grow quite bitter

          But many long-held but false assumptions will never even be reconsidered

Some may find great peace in knowing faith alone will see them through

          Others continue to ignore those who pimp religion’s pretty whore

All our lives we comfort in the fact that we always have tomorrow

So it’s quite hard to accept there is no more time to be borrowed

Can I draw from long hours spent praying or squandered in front of TV

          Do I await a re-uniting with those loved ones who left in front of me

Some make wondrous plans for a future others see shrouded in uncertainty

          Faith-based reservations can be made but arrival comes without a guarantee

We can still speak of someday but there are many things that won’t get done

          We can try to forget and to ignore but it will never be again like it was before

It was never supposed to come to this, not for me, in any case

          Dying was like being old, possible only for some other race

My grandma said she would never leave me, but long ago she went away

          I still did not grasp it all, even when mom and dad could not stay

And now as I lay here, so stiff and very still, I see others who have different plans

          To them it is very obvious I cannot escape, but that they most surely will

Lines From Our Obituaries

Among his hobbies were going out to eat and watching NASCAR races

She always coordinated her pre-planned outfits with utmost care

He had an impressive collection of pornographic websites saved on computer

She cooked them delicious meals using canned and pre-packaged ingredients

He enjoyed driving his loud pickup truck with its expensive custom mufflers

She drove safely while talking on her cellphone and sipping expensive lattes

He spoke with Jesus regularly after the deep shock of his mid-life coronary

She was serious about watching every single episode of all her favorite TV shows

His own opinions were often voiced by others on television, the internet and radio

Vacation planning was an important aspect of her life satisfaction

They enjoyed discussing sports and movies with him after boring meetings

All her trash was always tied up neatly inside of shiny plastic bags

He owned several weapons which he enjoyed firing in his spare time

Her granddaughter was a single mother before her grandma was 45

He only drank to excess on the weekends and missed very little work

She put 15000 miles a year on an SUV that never left their town

He was a valued patron of the gaming industry and nearly a poker expert

She was on a gossiping first name basis with the stars in all her magazines

His yard was always cut short and quite green and his garage was very clean

She was so attractive that she remained a hooker until well after turning 40

His knowledge of beer commercials was impressively encyclopedic

She was ever feisty despite her emphysema, diabetes and obesity

He pursued a career in drug addiction and did graduate work in prison

She worked full-time and raised children with absolutely equal attention to both

He drove heavy equipment and found it unnecessary to ever read

She was a professional real estate agent who made friends very quickly

He had no patience with those worn-out, liberal cowards who live in France

She supported our troops and hoped they all came back safe and sound

He rolled his credit card debt into his home mortgage on three occasions

She decorated every year for each season and every holiday

He had a healthy mistrust of fuzzy thinkers such as scientists

She always kept her hair dyed right down to the roots

He took his wife to Las Vegas for that very special 25^th anniversary

She never drove around the town with her car windows down

In his mind, he carried his excess weight like so much powerful muscle

She was proud of her gifted children and kept them strictly to their meds

He brought them the latest home entertainment he had bought on shaky credit

She got a part-time MBA and was quickly advanced to middle management

He financed a loud Harley and dressed up expensively for short rides on Saturdays

She tried to banish her cellulite with the various creams she saw on TV

He was never observed to simply be out walking - Anywhere, anytime

She eased the suffering of menopause with alcohol, pills and bitchiness

He began saving for retirement around age 55, but the economy then went south

Her friends all said she was a wonderful home entertainer

Despised by subordinates, dismissed by superiors, he was quite irrelevant at home

She tried hard to visit her Mom at the nursing home at least once a month

He loved the outdoors and drank beer there as often as he could

She learned to cook her own Meth in the kitchen of their apartment

As a high-powered sales executive he put his people skills to good use

Sometimes she power-walked for up to 20 minutes after lunch

When he went on vacation, people often thought that he must be quite well off

She fed the birds and squirrels as she poisoned the ants and wasps

He cut to the chase, stayed on message and met the bottom line at the end of the day

She believed in women’s rights and liked it when men held the door for her

He worked with great loyalty and they downsized him without a second thought

She delighted in tormenting her Ex for years after he unceremoniously kicked her to the curb

He honestly did not know the tired man staring at him from the mirror

She had a white, fuzzy, little dog that she talked to like a baby

He often had a strong urge to beat someone to death with his soft bare hands

She spent time in tanning booths because she felt that she was worth it

His barbecue grill cost $1500 and he had a little fridge out there as well

Her jewelry always drew stares of admiration from those in the know

He belonged to that proud fraternity of injured former would-be athletes

She quickly lost 15 lbs and bought stylish new clothes after her divorce

His friends down at the tavern always cashed his check for him on Fridays

She killed germs ruthlessly with the newest anti-bacterial cleanser available

His son once stole his credit card number and bought videogames on the internet

She tried volunteer work but those people did not appreciate her efforts

He tossed his burning cigarette butts aside wherever he might finish them

She spent hundreds a month on high-fat, low-fiber, packaged factory family foods

He sneered at the fool recyclers, tree huggers and energy conservationists

She found a secure job and caged the system for many unproductive years

His goal was to always keep the bed of his pickup truck very clean and empty

She enjoyed the little treat of having her nails done once a week

He always had the time to leer as the young secretaries passed on by

She braided her grey hair, wore Indian turquoise and smoked menthol cigarettes

He was nearly overcome by road rage on several different occasions

She noted happily that she did not grow old as did all her contemporaries

He believed the government should step aside and let him run his business

She devoured countless mystery and romance novels in her bathtub        

Though his eyesight and wind failed him, he never lost his badboy attitude

She survived her husband and got by alone for nearly twenty years

His self-esteem was low as he was but a weak and reviled high school teacher

She trained as a nurse to help others but burned out in a hurry

His great sensitivity denied him success in the Darwinian office arena

She dispensed spontaneously-generated  opinions freely on all manner of subjects

Violence, porn, beer, food and loud noises were the real joys of his life

She adopted each passing new-age fad as a singularly life-changing event

His behavior became more saint-like in proportion to the malignancy of his prostate

She loved baby animals and prepared delicious veal cutlets for her children

He looked forward to retirement and died 15 months thereafter

She clung grimly on to life and, in the end, it cost a cool half a million

He said that we should just level their useless countries with our nuclear weapons

She knew nothing and no one for the last three years of her life

He was taken in mid-flight on a journey he had never planned or reviewed

Her implants still looked good as ever even as they were embalming her

He desperately sought their unearned forgiveness for his abuse, anger and absence

She left behind thousands of cherished knick-knacks that they quickly threw away

His job was sent overseas, they canceled his retirement plan and so he defaulted on his debts

She spoke often of her money problems but saved until the day she died

He mixed business with pleasure until the concoction blew up in his face

She showed the children pictures from their shared past that they could not recall

All his long experience and hard-earned wisdom were totally ignored as pathetically irrelevant

Her old and faded pictures might have been of a woman of great beauty and grace

He built a huge second home as a place where he would try and bring the family together

Sometimes she found herself in tears for no apparent reason

He loved to get behind the wheel where he took control in heavy traffic

She had no desire to be rich or famous and in that she succeeded fully

His former colleagues still mention him every now and then at work

She filled them up with unavoidable guilt during each of their numerous visits

He certainly was not one to try to do more using less

She proudly displayed a knife wound sustained in a bar fight

His service in Vietnam provided a basis for guilt-free and lifelong dependency issues

She ignored livestock manufacturing conditions and shopped family meat on price alone

He shared a pro sports championship along with other loyal fans one year

She said she felt safer riding high in an SUV on the way to the grocery store

He adhered to a strict regimen of alcohol, tobacco, a poor diet and never exercised

She spent thousands on cosmetic surgery and wound up looking like a zombie

He could compare vehicle horsepower over many model years from memory

Her ankles gradually swelled as her obesity worsened her circulation

He often observed wryly to his fellows that when you are dead that you are dead

She knew in her heart of hearts that she was not descended from some ape

Enjoy Your Squalid Exceptionist Inheritance

Let the children decide...

We leave you our giant and inefficient homes for you to try and keep warm

You can see our gas-guzzling monster vehicles rusting in the junkyards

We offer you the opportunity to find the alternate energy we never sought

Go and mine the landfills for the finite, recyclable resources we so carelessly discarded

We have raised you to be confidently ignorant with a great sense of entitlement

Take these faded pictures of the smog-free Grand Canyon that we once knew

Enjoy the new and better jobs of tomorrow they promised when we were outsourced

Adventure cruise your Arctic now, safely free from icebergs and polar bears

Feel comfortable in the canned environment we built from coast-to-coast

We hope that you can spend some time in all the casino gambling venues we developed

Enjoy the love of loud-proud, petroleum-powered recreation that we instilled in you

Partake with both hands of the rich fast-food and snack heritage we have created

Act upon all those life lessons embedded in the video games you endlessly played

Noisily penetrate your forests now that we have opened them wide to all

Good luck overcoming our self-righteous, go-it-alone international policies

Be careful with the decaying roads, bridges, electrical, water and sewers

Here’s my old Spanish book, the brown majority will applaud your efforts

Keep an eye on this nuclear waste we buried for you and yours to come

Mind our close primate relations whom you will find only as inmates in our zoo prisons

We bequeath you the challenge of securing daily drinking water and firewood, on foot

Remember to decry immoral family planning while continuing to ignore childhood poverty

Use our cloak of Social Darwinism to make the less fit invisible in all their misery

Take over our mighty defense industry and ensure the world continually fights for peace

Just try and surpass our disdain for sustainability and efficiency

Continue industrial torture of soulless cows, pigs and chickens as god bid us to do

Peruse these records showing how cold it was and how much it used to snow

But you won’t have to worry about impotence, even during the great pandemics

Enjoy the persistent poisoned fruits of the grand partnership of chemical giants and agribusiness

No need to thank us for all the marvelous healthcare innovations that you cannot afford

Ppnder our old stories about swimming in blue lakes and clean rivers

Keep our literalist, evangelical beliefs working towards a Traditional Family Values future

Assume this vapid credit card debt we financed our phony lifestyles with for years

Continue demeaning scientists and engineers and don’t bother reading or doing the math

Go off and find yourself in this vast but center-less sprawl that we have created

Take up the mantle of our core values and the clear vision of our moral duties

Enjoy bulldozing all the cheap crap we hastily built as it rapidly decays

Take comfort in our fiction of the patriotic nature of your greed

Continue happily supporting the royal families we have ensconced to govern you

Good luck stumbling upon the environmental catastrophes we are unwittingly creating

Find your individual fulfillment and spiritual awareness among 9 billion others

Be glad that you do not have to worry about species that are already gone

Take the fruits of globalization and enjoy sharing equally in its grinding poverty

Relax and enjoy the relief from manufacturing and engineering leadership

Take up the foolish cycle of poisoning, fertilizing, watering and cutting artificially-green lawns

Try and partake in the benefits of the negative savings rate lifestyle that we pioneered

Continue to nurture that great culture of lobbyists and influence peddlers we built

Adopt our pseudo-scientific, jobs & money, stall tactics on any new regulatory issues

Cherish our god who is love and follow his bidding to spend trillions on national defense

For large sums of money, let industry experts produce government policy

Litter profusely anywhere, without the slightest guilt, based upon our good examples

Perhaps you can store CO2 emissions in the underground aquifers we already emptied

Always rely blindly on technology but disavow junk science for faith-based certainty

Relax and feel safe in the exploitative tourist meccas we created overseas

Experience being in the minority thanks to our love of cheap, illegal labor

Check out the great views where the ash, maples and elms used to grow

Breathe deeply of the mercury and sulphur-laden wastes we left in the air

Like us, barely notice as crime, ignorance and poverty mounts from all sides

Take more tax-deductible ski vacations in fundamentalist church vehicles

Quite easily swallow their latest propaganda thanks to our dumbing-down of your education

Rest easily within that patriotic sense of entitled exceptionism we have instilled within you

Continue blithely ignoring the quiet strangers who clean up all around you

But always remember your Nana as she lay babbling in her own wastes at that shabby nursing home

Last One Liners

Passed away over coffee on vacation down in Flarida

Were killed when the vehicle in which they were riding

Expired at home surrounded by friends and family

Died later upon the operating table

Resuscitation efforts failed after the rescue

Drowned in bed from lung congestion

Found cool and stiff on the couch next morning

Probably never felt a thing

Succumbed to extensive multi-system trauma

Passed away quite suddenly without any prior history

Died at home after suffering long from the illness

Expired on the pavement from excessive blood loss

Mostly women and children killed in a crush at the famous mosque

Was ejected from the vehicle involved in a rollover

Went into shock and never regained consciousness

Choked to death on a food obstruction following a drunken laugh

Sudden onset while doing yard work, earlier this Spring

Inhaled his own vomit which stopped effective breathing

Darted out in front of a slowly passing car

Taken ill at a family gathering

Hemorrhaged rapidly from a burst aneurysm

Expired alone of unknown causes

Passed away at Good Faith Hospice

Pronounced dead below the embankment

Suffered a coronary during a morning swim

Dozed off and struck a large oak tree

Died from a previously undiagnosed allergy

Ruled an accidental overdose

Became the latest victim of the outbreak

pronounced dead by officials at the scene

expired later from several gunshot wounds

perished in her crib from unknown causes

collapsed and never said another word

struck by a vehicle turning in front of his motorcycle

investigators said alcohol may have been involved

stabbed repeatedly at a holiday gathering

beaten to death outside a liquor store

shot in an apparent robbery attempt

killed in a dispute over a drug deal gone bad

failed to negotiate the curve

names were not released pending notification of kin

conveyed to police Sunday at approximately 3:00 AM

reportedly the victim struck his head

listed officially as Dead Upon Arrival

honored an Advance Directive to withhold any treatment

recovered his body at a depth of approximately ten feet

forced to euthanize the victim’s over-protective dog

driver of the semi was cited for improper equipment

confirmed the killing of the US diplomat

showed signs of an extra-judicial execution

autopsy confirmed she died of strangulation

opened fire at a checkpoint and killed at least sixteen

suspected suicide bomb exploded outside the luxury hotel

One villager was killed and 10 others wounded by grenades

savaged her in a cheap blanket after she was strangled

both murder suspects were wounded and later captured

found unconscious in the apartment and later charged in her death

cause was believed to be a massive heart attack

have been publicly hanged where the bombings took place

suffered from high blood pressure, diabetes and chronic emphysema

cause of death not listed, pending a coroner’s report

following unrest six weeks ago

showed grainy images of the beheading

slaughtered thousands when the disease was confirmed

began again with acute chest pain triggered by chronic stress

died when a hospital lacked the supplies to treat him