reality

This country that
claims to stand for
freedom and human rights
is as adept at being inhumane
as any place it has
sent its spies and soldiers

Instead of guns and bombs
this country controls and
punishes its people with
red tape and bureaucracy

This does not feel like
the “land of the free”

The pain inflicted on
this country originate
domestically but it is
customary to aim the
blame globally

This country
violates human rights
much more insidiously,
killing the people who
do not have the money
to live far from refineries
and highways and factories,
the people who cannot
pay to insure their right
to live healthily,
the people who were
slated from before
the beginning to
starve and to suffer

And beneath every supposed
justification for invasion
there’s a long line of
corporations salivating
over the aftermath,
to squeeze profits from
rubble under the guise
of reconstruction

This country was built
upon destruction
and does not know
how to change.

This does not feel like
the “land of the free”