Government-Sanctioned Murder for Mr. Trump

You know, Donald Trump once said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and he wouldn't lose any followers, and I think that is where were are now with his Fascist regime.  It is no longer a question, "Will Donald Trump begin killing Americans?"  It is a statement, "Donald Trump has begun killing Americans" -- and he will not lose any followers.  He is allowing his deputized and untrained Klansmen, his Murder of Morons (to use the collective noun for crows), to kill with impunity.  There will be gaslighting, lies, and cover-ups after each killing -- and hefty bonuses paid out to the killers  too, I suspect -- and circling back to the quote to which I alluded earlier -- we could call what is happening in Minnesota and across the nation "Operation 5th Avenue."  

I suspect you can tell that I am THOROUGHLY disgusted.  NEVER in my lifetime did I think I'd witness government-sanctioned murder to advance the agenda of the leader of an international ring of pedophiles -- but here were are.
​

So why this post?  Each week I publish new "Featured Poems of the Week" on my site, and the poems remain up for three weeks as I cycle through various poems -- and then they disappear. For the last three weeks, the poems have focused on the Trump- and GOP-sanctioned murders of American citizens -- and before they disappear, I thought I'd post them here on my plog (poetry blog) to preserve them. 

Here's the most recent, posted for the week of of 1/25/26.  I was a little late posting these poems, and here's what I said:

WEEK OF 1/25/26:

A FEW NOTES:

Okay, the poems are up.  BUT -- earlier this morning, before I was able to post the poems, I wrote this:

I apologize -- I'm a bit behind in my responsibilities!  I'm working on this week's Featured Poems -- plus I'm battling the clock in a way, as I suspect I'll lose power soon due to the snow and ice outside!  YIKES -- I'll try to hurry!

I'm also trying to decide:  do I post something in response to the horrific news again since Trump's neo-Nazi Klansmen murdered another American in broad daylight?  Or maybe something about the snow? 

I'll try to get something posted soon!  Thank you for your patience.

Fortunately, the power is on (for now!) and I've solved my dilemma about what to post:  I found a poem by Emmett Lee Dickinson that addresses both the snow AND government-sanctioned murder!  Below on the left, one of our Featured Poems of the Week is "They dropped like Flakes" by Emmett Lee Dickinson, and on the right, Emily Dickinson's poem with the same first line, our other Featured Poem.  

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

They dropped like Flakes –
They dropped like stars –
Like Buds cut from a Pot –
When suddenly in broad daylight
The men with weapons – shot –
 
Two perished as we Witnessed It –
No eye could miss the truth –
And Those in power spun more lies
Of their Repulsive – Acts

By Emily Dickinson:
​
They dropped like Flakes –
They dropped like stars –
Like Petals from a Rose –
When suddenly across the June
A wind with fingers – goes –

They perished in the Seamless Grass –
No eye could find the place –
But God can summon every face
Of his Repealless – List.

---

For the previous week, I posted the following:

WEEK OF 1/18/26:

A FEW NOTES:

Never in my lifetime did I think I'd witness a so-called "president" lead a domestic terrorist organization of masked members of Proud Boys and the KKK with orders to abduct human beings and engage in human trafficking.  Never in my lifetime did I think I'd witness government-sanctioned murder of US citizens.  Never in my lifetime did I think we'd elect a so-called "president" who wants to turn the US military against on our own citizens.  

​In honor of Renee Good, the American citizen and mother of three who was murdered in broad daylight by Trump's goon squad of racists and neo-Nazis, I have posted Emmett Lee Dickinson's "It now sounds so terrible -- more -- than it did" as one of our Featured Poems of the Week.  Dickinson's poem inspired his third cousin Emily to pen her poem "It don't sound so terrible -- quite -- as it did," our other Featured Poem.​

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:

It now sounds so terrible – more – than it did –
I watch it over – “Dead,” Damn! – Dead!”
Put up his Gun -- blasted her skull –
Those around shrieked so – she was killed!
 
He shot her three times – full in the face
Her Trouble looked simplest –
Shit she – just –
Said “That’s fine, Dude. I’m not mad at you –“
And she began to drive Away.
 
I know it will interrupt me some  
I can’t get accustomed – of then and Tomb
Like other lost Rights – grow smaller – now –
And smaller, by Cruelty –
 
They’re shrewder now
Spread their Lies in advance – when asked –
To make “a fit” – spin –
Murder – masked!

By Emily Dickinson:

It don't sound so terrible—quite—as it did--
I run it over—"Dead", Brain—"Dead."
Put it in Latin—left of my school--
Seems it don't shriek so—under rule.

Turn it, a little—full in the face
A Trouble looks bitterest--
Shift it—just--
Say "When Tomorrow comes this way--
I shall have waded down one Day."

I suppose it will interrupt me some
Till I get accustomed—but then the Tomb
Like other new Things—shows largest—then--
And smaller, by Habit--

It's shrewder then
Put the Thought in advance—a Year--
How like "a fit"—then--
Murder—wear!

BONUS FEATURED POEM:  I set Emily Dickinson's poem "The last night that she lived" to music a few years back.  I have now "tweaked" the lyrics of the song -- based on Dickinson's poem -- in tribute to Renee Good.

Below on the left:  Dickinson's poem.  Below on the right:  The lyrics of my song based on Dickinson's lines.

By Emily Dickinson:

The last Night that She lived
It was a Common Night
Except the Dying – this to Us
Made Nature different

We noticed smallest things –
Things overlooked before
By this great light upon our Minds
Italicized – as 'twere.

As We went out and in
Between Her final Room
And Rooms where Those to be alive
Tomorrow were, a Blame

That Others could exist
While She must finish quite
A Jealousy for Her arose
So nearly infinite –

We waited while She passed –
It was a narrow time –
Too jostled were Our Souls to speak
At length the notice came.

She mentioned, and forgot –
Then lightly as a Reed
Bent to the Water, struggled scarce –
Consented, and was dead –

And We – We placed the Hair –
And drew the Head erect –
And then an awful leisure was
Belief to regulate – 

The Last Night that She Lived

The last Night that She lived
It was a Common Night
Except her Murder — this to Us
Made Nature different
 
We noticed all the smallest things –
Like how he circled her
Like how he drew his gun and fired
Like how he taunted her
 
     And We watched ev’ry angle filmed
     Before she died
     And knew that she should be alive
     Tomorrow but for him

     That Others will exist
     While She must end this way
     And know our government was
     Twisting facts with hate like clay

We watched the replays as she passed –
It was a narrow time –
Too jostled were Our Souls to speak
At length the notice came.
 
And those in charge began to paint
The truth that we had seen
Their words now echoed his contempt –
To fit their wicked scheme –  

     And We watched ev’ry angle filmed
     Before she died
     And knew that she should be alive
     Tomorrow but for him

     That Others will exist
     While She must end this way
     And know our government was
     Twisting facts with hate like clay

For the week before that, I posted the following:

WEEK OF 1/11/26:

A FEW NOTES:

I started this site in the spring of 2013, and I started posting "Featured Poems of the Week" at that time.  Every week I share one pome by Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson's third cousin, twice removed -- at her request) and one poem by Emily Dickinson.  Occasionally I share additional poems in a given week, but only once -- if my memory serves me correctly -- only once have I featured a poem by different poet.  I know a few years back I shared a humorous poem by Nancy Friedman as a Featured Poem of the Week.  Alas, I can't recall now what the background was as to why I shared her lines or what the topic of the poem was -- though I do remember it was a humorous take on a current event.  

This week marks the second time I've highlighted a poet other than the two Dickinsons, Emmett Lee and Emily.  This week's Featured Poem of the Week is "On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs" by Renee Nicole Good, the American citizen murdered this past week by an ICE agent, the coward and micro-penised Jonathan Ross. 

Good wrote the poem while she attended Old Dominion University (by coincidence, where I attended college), and it won a poetry contest in 2020  sponsored by the Academy of American Poets. 


 “On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs”
By Renee Nicole Good
 
i want back my rocking chairs,
solipsist sunsets,
& coastal jungle sounds that are tercets from cicadas and pentameter from the hairy legs of
        cockroaches.

i’ve donated bibles to thrift stores
(mashed them in plastic trash bags with an acidic himalayan salt lamp--
the post-baptism bibles, the ones plucked from street corners from the meaty hands of zealots, the dumbed-down, easy-to-read, parasitic kind):

remember more the slick rubber smell of high gloss biology textbook pictures; they burned the hairs
        inside my nostrils, & salt & ink that rubbed off on my palms.

under clippings of the moon at two forty five AM I study&repeat
               ribosome
               endoplasmic--
               lactic acid
               stamen

at the IHOP on the corner of powers and stetson hills--

i repeated & scribbled until it picked its way & stagnated somewhere i can’t point to anymore, maybe my gut-- maybe there in-between my pancreas & large intestine is the piddly brook of my soul.

it’s the ruler by which i reduce all things now; hard-edged & splintering from knowledge that used to sit, a cloth against fevered forehead.

can i let them both be? this fickle faith and this college science that heckles from the back of the 
        classroom
               now i can’t believe--
               that the bible and qur’an and bhagavad gita are sliding long hairs behind my ear like mom
                      used to & exhaling from their 
               mouths “make room for wonder”--

all my understanding dribbles down the chin onto the chest & is summarized as:
life is merely
to ovum and sperm
and where those two meet
and how often and how well
and what dies there.

​

You can hear the poem read aloud by clicking on the photo below:

​​Good's wife's statement is read below ("We had whistles. They had guns."):

You can hear about the coward's very telling reaction to his killing below:

Dog killer Kriti Noem and Diapered Don reacted within minutes spinning lies and disinformation about the murder.  They tried to get ahead of the story by painting Good as a domestic terrorist -- when they themselves are the terrorists.  EVERYTHING THEY SAID AND POSTED WAS A LIE!  WATCH THE VIDEOS.