This poem reminds me of the Lewis Carroll classic, The Walrus and the Carpenter. Especially the stanza that begins, “The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things…” Like that poem, this one is filled with absurdity and euphemisms and wishful thinking. And crocodile tears, about leading the gullible astray. Thanks for coming by to read.
“Just politics,”
The lawman said
As he stared at the TV.
“They’re trying to ruin
His reputation.
With the facts, they’re free.
“They’re trying to find
A smoking gun.
His gun has never smoked!
They’ll never find
A thing on him.”
The scoffing lawman spoke.
The witnesses,
The paper stacks,
The emails and the texts…
“They don’t ‘mount to
A hill of beans!”
The lawman screams. “What’s next?!”
The lesser aides,
The perp parades,
The men behind closed doors:
“It’s just for show!
What do they know?
To prove it, they need more.”
The gutless guilty
Huddle, and
Subpoenas, they defy.
Referrals go
To Justice,
But “It’s just a pack of lies!
“Why should they
Make appearances?
Subpoenas have no power!
So what, if they
Are in contempt?
Or in a prison’s bower?
“These men are
Heroes, to defy
An all-intrusive State!
I bet they’d
Summon Santa,
If his reindeer showed up late!”
And yet, each day
Another trickle
Leaks out to the Press.
“What difference
Does that make?
The news is fake!” the lawman says.
“We don’t need
A Commission!
It’s a waste of tax and time!
We should be
Making laws,
Not raking over ancient crimes!”
At last, it
Hits the papers
And explodes across the page:
The smoking gun!
He is the one,
The butt of blame and rage.
The lawman
And compatriots
Sit threesome in a row.
One holds his eyes.
One holds his ears.
And one, his lips won’t show.
“You never will
Convince me!”
Shouts the lawman. “It’s a draw!
For I reject
Your premise:
I reject The Rule of Law.”
Copyright 2022 Andrea LeDew
For another hymn to the rule of law, but in a different context, read Suddenly Silent. For a ballad to the badly treated, read The Wardrobe of Kings (Poem).
Veto
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Talk about people who have sold their souls to the Devil for their own self-aggrandizement . . . It’s beyond disgusting.
After reading the Walrus and the Carpenter again, I see more and more parallels.
I just reread it. You’re right about the parallels.