After Ron DeSantis 

 

They like to think they don’t need us 

Those holy few 

But who will make them feel righteous  

If not us? 

Who will make them feel pure  

If they don’t have us to rage against? 

I don’t know what they know 

But I tell you what, 

I’ve seen a fragile and feeble 

Fawn take its very first steps on wobbly, 

Tender legs 

And I know, too, that fawn will drink 

Dirty water if that’s all you offer it 

If all it has to drink is something 

Horrible and vile it will choose to 

Drink rather than die of thirst 

I know because I drank that water myself  

Seeing no alternative  

Offered to me by people who really loved me 

But I’ve since learned  

That is not love 

What they’re doing is not love 

And maybe they really thought it was 

Think it is 

That’s the scary part  

The almost saddest part 

But when you ingest toxins 

Your life expectancy decreases  

Sometimes a lot sometimes a little  

But always in the wrong direction  

With those toxins 

In the blood  

I have no pretense at holiness  

I think that word is more a fiction  

Than anything else  

But I would not serve poison to a fawn 

And pretend to be its savior 

I would not pour for it invective  

And force it then to drink 

They like to think they don’t need us 

That yammering, smelly crowd of hollow 

Bullying bullshitters passing  

This or that law  

Always to protect the children  

From the phantoms they invent  

I’d laugh at their idiocy  

If their ignorance wasn’t so damaging 

Of you and me and us and even them 

So fucking, deeply damaging  

I used to drink the water they offer 

And I tell you what, it’s poison 

It takes courage to set it down and walk away  

But we can help each other do just that 

I promise you  

When you do, 

You’ll notice spring water  

Flows all around us.