|
Diane Elayne Dees
Hurricane Plan
When the levees broke and waters rushed
throughout the city that care forgot,
the old, the sick, the lame, the poor
were left to drown, to starve and die.
Throughout the city that care forgot,
the ones who could not help themselves
were left to drown, to starve and die.
The frightened dogs and cats and birds --
the ones who could not help themselves --
tossed into the streets like trash;
the frightened dogs and cats and birds
who watched the buses roll away.
Tossed into the streets like trash,
lost in a polluted lake,
they watched the buses roll. Away
from rug and bed and perch,
lost in a polluted lake,
taken by the sudden storm
from rug and bed and perch.
Some would survive, some would not.
Taken by the the sudden storm
just when safety was assured,
some would survive. Some would not
ever see their homes again.
Just when safety was assured,
the old, the sick, the lame, the poor
would never see their homes again,
when the levees broke and waters rushed.
For Janis
I was only twenty-one the year you died,
and you just six years older. When the news
report was read, I don't believe I cried
(I probably was sleeping off the booze).
It didn't really sink in until later
that you had cut free from the ball and chain
you dragged around. A charming agitator,
you weren't afraid to talk about the pain.
I guess that's why I always felt I knew you,
and that you knew me, though we never met.
You weren't exactly what I'd call my guru;
you made a mess of your own life, and yet --
to this day, when I hear Bobby McGee,
I wish that you were here to comfort me.
©2007 by Diane Elayne Dees
Diane Elayne Dees has poetry recently published or forthcoming in
MOBIUS, The Eleventh Muse, Lily, Umbrella Journal, Tiger's Eye, and the
anthology, Hurricane Blues: How Katrina and Rita Ravaged a Nation. A series of
her poems is being read on "The Naturalist's Datebook," a segment of Martha
Stewart Living Radio, and one of her poems was recently nominated for a
Pushcart Prize.
|
