Ballad Of The Republicans By Paul Steven Stone

In the Somerville News:



Lyrical Somerville edited by Doug Holder


Paul Steven Stone is a local writer, and he wrote these lyrics to a new song "Ballad of the Republicans." Stone is the Creative Director for W.B. Mason and a member of Somerville's Bagel Bards. To have your work considered for the Lyrical send it to Doug Holder 25 School St. Somerville, Mass. 02143 dougholder@post.harvard.edu



Ballad Of The Republicans

By Paul Steven Stone



Hear the bombs bursting all through the night

Bush is bombing Baghdad, says he has the right

Thousands will die like many thousands before

Only problem is they'll never know what for...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Where men like Lincoln once took a stand

But now they took all that they could

Pretending it was for our good

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



The stealing starts on election night

Bush flies to victory on a Florida flight

Though exit polls say in fact he lost to Gore

Supremes give him the crown and so much more...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Eight years of plunder down in Washington

And now they hope that you'll forget

All the blunders, crimes and debt...

That for eight long years nearly brought this country down!



The CIA says Bin Laden will strike

But Bush is out that day riding his bike

Not till 9/11 does he figure out the score

Sees thousands lying dead, Twin Towers no more...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Rumsfeld, Rice and Cheney take a stand

Take us to Iraq thru Afghanistan

And can't take our asses out again

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



Did you see the scowl on Dick Cheney's face

When someone said torture is a human disgrace

That's no longer torture, he tells Fox news

Those Amnesty wimps are just singing the blues...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

They read our mail and tapped our phones

Said they could send anyone to jail

Then erased all White House email...

That showed eight long years of bringing this country down!



They never find any W.M.D.'s

They even search Abu Ghraib detainees

Turns out Saddam had run out of gas

And we're just bullies kicking his sorry ass...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Acting like the ugliest Americans

Paul Wolfowitz lusting at The Bank

Larry Craig tapping at toilet tanks

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



By now the middle class is feeling poor

Can't afford college or doctors anymore

Wages shrink but the rich keep getting fat

They even try to take social security back...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

They told us lies, rewarded their friends

Like Halliburton, Goldman Sachs and more

Then sent ill-equipped soldiers off to war

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



Back in New Orleans the wind starts to howl,

Water is a-rising, Brownie's on the prowl,

Bush is on a plane heading west for the coast

Flies over the waters just to see if blacks can float...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

They ran our country like a Christian scam

Tried to keep Terry Schiavo undead

Pulled the plug on stem cell research instead

For eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



Where are you when Wall Street gets the bends?

They're in the vault handing billions to their friends

Some of those billions simply disappear

The rest go to bonuses for needy millionaires

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

The ones who told us not to lie or sin

And then were caught with pants askew

Ensign, Foley, Vitter to name a few who...

In eight long years nearly brought this country down!

Then there's forgetful Alberto Gonzales

In all of Bush's gang none needs more solace

'Cept Harriet Miers in her Supreme Court mess

Or Scooter Libby lying for his V.P.-ness

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Said global warming would improve our tans

Their senior drug plan was so nice

'Cept they made the U.S. pay list price

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



Their biggest crime isn't Katrina or Iraq

Or turning U.S. Attorneys into G.O.P. hacks

Or leaving Afghanistan with the enemy still intact

It's torturing the truth till they break its damn back...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

Eight years of plunder down in Washington

They turned our surplus into debts

Gave shoddy care to wounded vets...

In eight long years they nearly brought this country down!



Now look at this mess the Bush gang leaves behind

Two wars in limbo, Wall Street flying blind

An economy gasping, the states in default

Obama tries to clean up and they claim it's all his fault...!

Here comes the ballad of the Republicans

They pray that you can just forgive their sins

And vote them back in power again

Forgetting all the lies, the graft and pain...

That for eight long years...eight god-forsaken years...nearly brought this country down!

LOVE-ZERO by A.D. Winans

LOVE-ZERO by A.D. Winans (Cross- Cultural Communications Merrick, NY 2010 www.cross-culturalcommunications.com) $10. 2010.

Review by Doug Holder

I have read many collections by the veteran poet A.D. Winans over the years. His latest Love-Zero, is a change—at least for me. It is an extended love poem; a mixture of the leather hide tough guy and the lovelorn romantic.

The collection boasts beautiful Picasso-like artwork from Norman J. Olson and a foreword from Neeli Cherkovski.

Winans writes of his fleeting romance with a much younger woman as if it was an amorous boxing match:

“… Thursday night
in chilly San Francisco
you play me like a violin
you got me on the ropes baby
those eyes those eyes the
look of a boxer
a micro-second before the
the knock-out.”

Winans is not afraid to express his vulnerability—-a touching concession to the siren call of love:

“ I wanted to hold your hand
touch your heart
but unsure of your reaction
I held back
later watching you drive away
lying alone in bed
hoping sleep came as hard for you
as it did for me.”

Like all flames they burn, flicker and then die. Winans uses Jack the Ripper and the hands of the nefarious gangster Dillinger to make his pain visible:

“ you became the knife in the
hands of Jack the Ripper
in a heavy fog in a back alley
in old London-town slicing
dicing your way through the
canvas of my heart
the pearl-handled revolver
in the hands of Dillinger
that begged to be fired…”

This is a beautifully produced book, with poetry that is worthy of its covers.

Highly Recommended.

Doug Holder/Ibbetson Update

Poet Ed Galing: 93: In a wheelchair: still writing: still kvetching

Poet Ed Galing, 93, in a wheelchair, still writing and still kvetching!

By Doug Holder

When you are 93 it is an achievement just to get up in the morning. Well in spite of his infirmities my old friend Ed Galing, the poet Laureate of Hatboro, Pa. still writes poetry and is being published by some of the finest literary magazines in America. Not only that he has still has the strength to gripe that the New York Quarterly refuses to publish him! Imagine that. I published Ed in every one of the 27 issues of the literary journal Ibbetson Street, and promised him that as long as he is alive I will continue to do so.

Ed wrote to me recently:

“I’m old and venerable at 93. Indeed it is a struggle everyday—so much on my own—even though there is help. I have a ramp now to go out—one needs fresh air. I go out on an electric scooter—a chair with a motor. I don’t think I will use the walker anymore as it is too painful in the knee joints. I miss my wife and our youth, but it’s over. Being alone is hard—facing death is hard also. I try hard to be optimistic. Poetry keeps me going.”

Ed Galing was born in the Lower East Side of New York City in 1917. A child of Jewish immigrants, much of his poetry harks back to the teeming streets of the Lower East Side, with its pushcarts, street urchins, the maze of outdoor markets, the frock coat Jews, the whole milieu that was so wonderfully described in Irving Howe’s “The World of our Fathers.”

Ed had some poems in the current issue of the Chiron Review; I’d like to share one of them with you. Just to remind you that Ed is not going gently into the good night. By-the-way- for a guy of his age his poems make you sing, reminiscent of Louie Armstrong’s famed croaking plea: “Take your shoes off Lucy and let’s get juicy.” So if you are looking for a wholesome poem look elsewhere!


FROM ME TO YOU ONLY

Just because I wind up in
A nursing home
Doesn’t mean it’s all over
Just because I had a stroke and am in a
Wheelchair
Don’t mean I can’t get
A hard on
Just because my
Nurse Olive, with
Her dark skin and long
Fingernails takes me
To the bathroom
Dresses and undresses me
Don’t mean she don’t notice
My hard on,
Just because this nursing
Place has a few
Hundred people in it suffering
All kind of maladies
Don’t mean I don’t feel
Sorry for them, knowing
Sooner or later we are
All gonna die in
This fuckin place,
Just because I am in here
Day after day
Don’t mean that Olive can’t
Give me a blow
Job when no one is
Looking,
She always licks her
Lips with her tongue
And says, you got a
Nice big cock and I
Love it that way,
Just because she gives me head
And makes me come
Don’t mean she is a cocksucker
She just does it cause
She knows I need it
Just because I tell you
All of this
Don’t mean I want you to go
Blabbing
About it,
This is between you and me.

--Ed Galing