Blue Voices for the Fourth of July

By Jerry W. Ward, Jr.

The Fourth of July, Frederick,

Isn’t a what but a fifth --

A bottle of dreadful freedom.

And sometimes, Frederick,

It is the baptism of greed.

Gluttony ate its declaration of independence,

An act of national security.

Once in a museum of eracism,

I epiphanied, went unblind.

Then I saw a billionaire

So dumb he thought

Iron maidens of pride are tanning beds.

Mammy Barbara once gave

Baby George a star-

Spanked napkin to wipe

His brow. She forgot

The offices of toilet tissue.

He forgot the remorse of toilets,

The envy of tissues.

Seven’s the color

Of your lover’s face

When too old to dream

You let lust go last,

The blue, the white, the red

Muscles ejaculating mess/

Ages for that world.

Black comes over all.

You so bad

We hear you write

Wrath with a bomb.

Frederick, why did not you,

Asserting the manhood of the slave,

Announce the sloth of slavers

Harbored fecal contagion?

posted 8 July 2007