Dora labors to turn newspaper pages.
Not aging. Or illness.
It is the news
that weighs upon her hand and arm.
Without the benefit of building muscle
as she turns through politics to sports.
Even when she listens to podcasts
they so often fill the air with heavy words
that the weight carried in implications and portents
settles deep in her lungs
and clogs her ears with depressed speculation
and what ifs.
It is as if our American society is an organism
about to self divide to form two.
Such is the movement away from union.
Pushed by lies like a century and a half ago.
Different lies, but lies all the same.
And passions lit like bonfires
with effigies of the opposition
and dirty tricks turned in the cast shadows.
copyright © 2021 Kenneth P. Gurney
Umflop 