Poetry Sunday: "Infrastructure"

Since this poem is so rooted in the news events of the week, I can't resist posting it here.  I do wonder if it will have any relevance, beyond historical curiosity, once this election year is far behind us.  I think that it will:  we will always have bombastic billionaires who want to build walls and the religious people who speak truth to that power, even as they are part of the powerful.


Infrastructure

From behind a wall
of security forces and fans,
the pope advises us to build
bridges, not walls. Unlike prophets
of old, he boards his private plane
to return to his enclave.
Does he dine
on locusts and wild honey?

From behind a wall
of wealth, the real estate mogul blusters
about possible attacks by Muslim
fanatics. He boards his private
jet and heads to the next campaign
stop, a contrail of vast sums
vanishing into vapor.

The rest of us go to our jobs
as we hope to maintain our slipping
old on security of any kind.
We’ve watched immigrants and robots
move into our workplaces.
We know no walls will hold
back the hunger for cheaper labor.
We wonder when the bridges
will crumble beneath our aging cars,
what river our final resting place.