Merch Table Under the Dome
Merch Table Under the Dome
Two hours beneath the dome of the United States Capitol,
and the air felt less like governance, more like a merch table.
He held the podium the way a bartender palms a lighter—
not to illuminate, but to spark.
The People’s House turned funhouse,
mirrors bending fact into applause lines.
The economy sat outside like an unpaid tab.
Groceries climbing like ivy through a cracked foundation.
Jobs thinning.
Tariffs swatted down by the Supreme Court of the United States
like an Ace on a bad bluff.
Instead: hockey anecdotes, medal shine,
Democrats arranged as living cutaways.
Bait cast into blue suits.
Clips marinating for social feeds.
He spoke of citizens as if citizenship were a decibel level—
Stand, he said,
prove your loyalty with your knees.
No mention of Renee Good.
No mention of Alex Pretti.
Names folded into silence like unused flags.
Fourteen shot since September,
and the word “affordability” never crossed the stage.
Outside, the polls sag like wet cardboard.
Inside, he calls the scoreboard fake.
This was not a State of the Union.
It was halftime at a rally where the mascot roars,
the lights stay bright,
and the house keeps pretending it isn’t on fire.
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Angrily shared with the world at large and those over at DVerse Poets Pub for OLN.
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THANK YOU! I so wish this could be published in every paper across the US. YES and YES some more! So many incredible lines:
ReplyDelete"He held the podium the way a bartender palms a lighter—
not to illuminate, but to spark.
The People’s House turned funhouse,
mirrors bending fact into applause lines."
"Stand, he said,
prove your loyalty with your knees"
And so many more. It was and awards show with him taking delight in describing violence, blood and gore. It was a travesty. As a septuagenarian, I PRAY this man is roundly defeated (as in the Republican party) in November. Then an impeachment that makes it through the House and the Senate and then imprisonment for this convicted felon.
An excellent poem....proving poetry has power!