Five Days
Reflections on the election, with love to David Bowie
• November 3, 2016 •
Pushing thru the market square
so many mothers sighing
News had just come over,
we had five days left to cry in
David Brooks wept and told us
America was really dying
Cried so much his face was wet
then I knew he was not lying
I heard iphones, Oprah house, Beyonce melodies
I saw trans-guys, drag queens, MtFs and T.V.’s
My eyes had fake lenses
My ears had fake ears
I had to look and to listen to right wingers fears
And all the liberal-conservative people, and all the libertarian-green party people
And all the cat-video people, and all the dog-video people
I never thought I’d hate so many people
A Republican my age went off her head
hit some tiny Mexicans
If Tony the Tiger hadn’t a-pulled her off, I think she would have had Rice Chex again.
A Boomer with pneumonia, fixed her stare on some email,
A Klansman knelt and kissed the feet of Paul Ryan
and Kate Bornstein threw up at the sight of that
I think I saw you in an pot dispensary
smoking Purple Urkle in a lovely fog.
Smiling and waving and looking so fine
don’t think you knew you were in this blog.
And it was cold and it rained so I wrote down this riddle
And I thought of David Bowie and I missed him a little
You’re tender, your gender, the way that you float
I kiss you, you’re beautiful, I WANT YOU TO VOTE
We’ve got five days, stuck on my eyes
We’ve got five days, what a surprise
We’ve got five days, my brain hurts a lot
We’ve got five days, that’s all we’ve got
Jenny Boylan is the author of Falcon Quinn and the Bullies of Greenblud, the Anna Quindlen Writer in Residence at Barnard College of Columbia University, a New York Times Contributing Opinion Writer, and National Co-chair, GLAAD.
