after America

For a time you won't like what comes after America...

Can one stay American after the Republic is gone?. 

For a time... after America, after the beacon is extinguished

fear will overwhelm; we come through this interregnum

overcome by thoughts, overcome by a before and an after, 

thought bubbles of we the people

hope shadows a wish for a slow decline in this inevitable demise,

after America...

In these united states of falter, hope marches into uncertainty 

alongside pervasive decay without an international leader. 

So say goodnight to a world where dreams of democracy flourish.

Say your global goodbyes in this power vacuum, no one capable of the role

after America.

What will come and who will stand in our future

after America?

Wildfires too extreme for the black-backed woodpecker

repeat the shrill, a hoarse-tchur in their descent 

on the edge char, char after America...

Woke past of wake on all injustices after America 

the wake carried them away with all their wokeness into eco-disaster

after eco-disaster two Octobers ago,

down, down descent naming incongruous winds 

through dead trees after America

look from sea to shining sea to fathom the fetch.

Beckoning wave separates what should be separated,

collapse. Founder to shore on backs of the masses stretch.

The fetch of a wave is the distance it travels...energy generated

killing the yellow reckoning force. Fall asleep to the sound

of katabatic spindrift, ear to shell echoed straight from the source 

to the depth of its foundation two Octobers ago.

Below the turbulent level of the seas  it could be 

a godsend floating triangular atoll

in international waters of freedom,

it could be...the whole afterburn

many dawns after America. Steady-state human song churn

banners question, can humanity succeed

after America?  If humanity is to succeed it will be initiated by inventions

not by the lethal biases of patriarchy, not by debilitating politics.

Clutch the security state inevitable demise

no bones after America

catch pop the clutch, no nation is ready in this interregnum, Goodnight world... 

where dreams of democracy once flourished. You won't like what comes after America!

Off the sound, I saw it coming just as I had his– before the death of nations

made obsolete in decades of globalization…so irreversible in kelp farms,

fall asleep to the rising ocean sound. 

After America 

so many Octobers ago,

imagine a new political system not yet conceived.