Asleep At The Switch Poem by Laurence Overmire

There were bombs exploding in Iraq
Babies turning blue in the immovable quash of rubble
A government twisting truths into the most
Outrageous kinds of lies
The end-game justifying the means

But no one would believe

The long years of children left behind a hoax
Come to fruition, dusty books that no one
Reads, impossible to distinguish the text from the
Con

Old words make sweet bonfires

The world spinning in a drunken haze
All a blur of light and sound and colorized
Image

The patient on his etherized table his
Hamburger heart pumping beer and blue-eyed
Bimbos into the vain artery of his
American unconscious

O, we may wonder, and O
We may die

Sleep the good sleep

Someday maybe
Someone will wake up, alone to find
And ask the inevitable question
A hundred years too late

Why?

Why didn’t anyone try to stop
The madness?


(Previously published in The Hold, Oct. '04)