Election Issue
The full-moon bear drives dogs crazy tonight.
He wrecks birdfeeders at the neighboring
Houses without hounds. Talk of the town,
That bear. Of course, there are many such bears.
Lots of folks are saying government should
“Do Something!” Do what? Kill off the browsing bruin?
Drive another species into ruin?
Big green lawns are replacing miles of wood,
Appeasing sprawling middle class cares.
Do we need lots more houses up and down
The valley? More bulldozers laboring
But no black bears lumbering through the night?
To stop suburban blight and unchecked bloat
I say we enfranchise bears. Let them vote.
Stephen DiLauro is a wandering bard. You can read his monthly In the Bohemian Continuum column, in print and digitally, in the downtown Manhattan newspaper The Village Star-Revue. Readings of his poems can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/@internetbardtv
Very cool rhyme scheme!
Thank you, Cynthia! I came up with it in the 1970s. My first published poem ever, in the NY Times, employed this pattern.
Thank you, Cynthia! I came up with it in the 1970s. My first published poem ever, in the NY Times, employed this pattern. This one first appeared on the opinion page of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Stephen, I can assure you all kinds of bears will vote in California, if they haven’t already deposited the absentee ballots mailed to everyone’s address in one of the widely available official ballot boxes.
Not to laugh, though, bear incursions have become extremely problematic in Japan. There have been thousands of sightings in towns and cities, and numerous attacks in which elderly people have been injured and sometimes killed. It’s blamed on climate change disturbing bear habitat and human population decrease in outlying areas, along with fewer licensed hunters. However, just a month ago the first emergency shooting of a bear was okayed in Tokyo!