By Ric Hudgens

We seem silly
adolescent
singing songs of love and romance
as innocents are daily crushed
between power and circumstance.

How trivial
self-centered
better odes of wrath and hatred.
The Arctic is ablaze!
The Amazon decimated!

When fascists make the rules
burn the bridges
raise the walls
the love we feel seems petty,
mere tenderness appalls.

Grief and sorrow every day
and moaning every night
and hope it seems
in short supply
there’s only might and might.

If words could hold back
brutal force or rhyming
heal division, our world
could be united round one
single creed and vision.

We’ve always known
it isn’t simple, although now
such wisdom sours, so we’re
counting down the decades,
even years and soon the hours.

To feel your sigh or
touch your face amid
this strife, gives me such
solace, truth, and joy.
You give me life.

So I won’t forsake each smile
nor discount your soft caresses,
no, I’ll treasure every one
against the tide of fates
that press us.

Don’t ask me to still
my heart, nor keep love
at a distance. Our passion
isn’t everything, but
it’s core to our resistance.