WIRE-TAPS

I hear the tragedy of wire-taps upon the world house.

The yantras of soldiers & revenues & insensate machinery.

We are cut off, at the enemy’s mercy, none clapping for us.

We will not know what the crowd around us means.

Alas for the generation that would withdraw

Unnoticed, silent & speechless––from life escape––

Curious, bare eyes gazing at the moon.

Gone the wondrous thoughts of America.

My affection is greater than acceptance and rejection.

After all the evidence is weighed,

Where do these wire-taps lead?

The answer is here, but not in words.

Not recoiling from my own trampled fate,

Thousands sternly immolate themselves for one.

They depart with cheerfulness, freely giving up life.

They are men & women as divine as myself.

15 February 2003

Spoken word version from Trashtalking Country.

Copyright © 2005 by Jim Cohn.