Builder
Hey builder
I think this system they built is broken
The paint is chipping red, white, and blue
The walls are cracking, the plaster is reused

Hey builder
Can you hear me from behind that screen?
Swords and silence erode infrastructure
One can’t prevail without the other
It’s not your fault but,

Can you help us fix it?

Pocket full of sunshine
Tool belt full of promise
Builder says
“ I’m not just a builder, I’m a prophet”

“Looking into 2051
I’m sorry to report, there are no flying cars
Just sick kids
Whose parents never grimaced at the thought of a bill
For fear of healing debt

Hate to be the bearer of bad news but,
I saw no teleportation tubes
Just people boarding a bus
Pulling nothing but a smile, a polite inquiry, and
And thank you
At the end of their journey

Sorry to tell but this vision suggest, no robot assistance
Just children
Who can think for themselves

Children
Who never have to grow up quick,
Never have to know the difference between a gunshot and a firework
Because what is a gun but a relic of yesteryears mistakes
A failing of our ancestors,
Meant to protect but prolonged in existence til danger claimed its main purpose
Just children
Who’ve never felt an empty belly
Save for being too picky to eat their greens

I’m sorry

There will be no spaceships to Mars
Just the same old Earth
With the same old soil
And the same old water, just like Mama made

As they say once an adult and twice a child
We learned reciprocity in the process of destroying her womb only when it collapsed in on itself with us inside
Squeezing air from the same lungs it provided for

We earned redemption, caring for our aging mother
We reap the fruits of her recovery in abundance
Just like every other mother
She gives and gives and gives

Only now we no longer salt the dirt to mark the parts of her kindness we’d explored

My apologises if this disappoints,
Truly
But there are no cyber prisons
Or any prisons for that matter because
Slavery is finally illegal

After wrenches of resistance
Dismantled the pipeline funneling cheap labor
Out of necessity driven early human error
Hardly any souls could be rounded up to haunt the halls
Suddenly
Convicts turned school kids

To my surprise
Citizens got wise
And well
To summarize
No more gentle parenting presidents

Broken free from a grandiose delusion
Of America the great
America the big bad wolf, finally learns how to negotiate
The “leader of the free world” takes a pre-k class
And discovers solutions that don’t involve
Violence

Abruptly
the lives of the young and healthy in this country
Is no longer a sacrifice he’s so graciously
Willing to make.”

So if that’s what you see, why are you just staring at me
Hammer in hand?
Builder says: “Donning the same orange vest and steel toe’d boots,
have you even noticed the same tools in my belt also straddle your waist?”