Poetry

Beto O’Rourke photo

By

Ben White

What’s a Texan to Do?

Texas is caught

In a web of twisted history;

Faced with having to vote

For the Democratic challenger –

Young, intellectually fresh,

And liberal-minded –

Who will oppose their president,

Or else vote for

The incumbent senator –

A man whose father –

According to facts

Their president provided –

Sided with Cuban Communists

And helped Lee Harvey Oswald

Kill JFK…

That’s a vote

For the senator whose wife

Their president tells them

Isn’t hot enough

To represent the party’s ideal

Of the little lady at home

And that’s a vote

For a senator who flipped

And flopped his values

To support his attacker

Despite the hateful

Things that were said,

And presented to be true

About his family,

So the choice appears to be

Between a Democrat

And the son of a Communist –

And though their president

Seems to love

His ex-Soviets

From the ideal little lady in the White House

To his puppet-master in the Kremlin,

What’s a Texan to do

When there’s nothing they can do?

Well,

There is the young,

Intellectually fresh

And liberal choice

Who is there and running

To pull them up through

A new grassroots beginning

With a vision of stability,

Clean air for the future,

Health care,

And human rights,

Right now

Though that will mean

They will have to pop

Their president’s bubble

And face some truth.

Ben White

Author of the books, Buddha Bastinado Blues and The Kill Gene, Ben White thought he was a poet, only to find out he is not a poet at all. He is a witness. What he writes is testimony.