Month: November 2013

Thanksgiving or Thanks-getting?

/ Greg Asimakoupoulos

Examining the essence of this holiday

Thanksgiving’s now Thanks-getting.
Once we’ve gobbled up the bird
we’ll head off to department stores
to line up with the herd.

A stampede has replaced the nap.
A family day at home
has given way to shopping sprees
while Grampa’s left alone.

Gone are the holidays we knew
of table games and fun.
“Let’s take a walk” has now evolved
to “Sorry, gotta run!”

It used to be that Macy’s
was content with a parade.
But now it seems it won’t be happy
’til it has our trade.

Thanks-getting’s getting to me.
It’s a sacrilege. It’s wrong.
It’s filling up a day with greed
where gratitude belongs.

Let’s boycott stores that undermine
the reason for this day.
Let’s hang with fam’ly, eat some pie
and take some time to pray.

The Death of a President

/ Greg Asimakoupoulos

Remembering my reactions to the news from Dallas

A half a century has passed
since deafening and shocking gasps
were heard throughout all fifty states
that bleak November day.

“From Dallas,” Walter Cronkite said,
“The president’s been shot. He’s dead!
The victim of a sniper’s aim
has left us leaderless.”

It seemed as if my world stood still
although I could not get my fill
of non-stop news that chronicled
the nightmare of that day.

I still recall that long weekend.
I was eleven way back then.
But not too young to fully feel
the sting of corporate grief.

I watched as Oswald flinched in pain
and as we learned Jack Ruby’s name.
And though I went to Sunday School,
my mind was not on God.

The images on our TV
were black and white (ironically).
The brilliant colors of my world
had suddenly turned gray.

The simple view of life I’d had
was shattered by this glimpse of bad.
The death of John F. Kennedy
had opened my young eyes.

Fast-forward half-a-century
to where I look back soberly
and glimpse the day I first beheld
how evil stalks our land.

The New Biggest Loser

/ Greg Asimakoupoulos

Why Toronto’s mayor should step down

Well, that mayor in Toronto
swears he won’t use crack again,
says he smoked it only once while really drunk.
And perhaps he’s learned his lesson
and deserves a second chance.
But I’m prone to think he’s guilty as a skunk.

Mayor Ford is not a Lexus.
What he looks like is a wreck.
He needs body work to earn respect again.
And a tune-up is in order.
He’s not hitting on all eight.
If this hot rod runs again Rob will not win.

Put him on “The Biggest Loser.”
Let him sweat for what he’s done.
Maybe Jillian can help the mayor learn
that bad choices get you fired.
Your career goes up in smoke
and it’s calories that you’d do best to burn.

Held Hostage By Fear

/ Greg Asimakoupoulos

What the constant gun violence is doing to us

Another shooting?
God, forbid that bloodshed be the norm.
Those trigger-happy madmen aim at will.
The frequency of terror
finds us fearing what awaits
as those rifle-toting crazies shoot to kill.

At airports, schools or shopping malls,
at theatres or homes,
it is hunting season twelve months of the year.
And the hunters aren’t just grownups.
Far too often they are kids.
Without answers, we’re imprisoned by our fear.

We are hostages just living.
And it?s fear that holds us fast
in a mental cell of raw anxiety.
God alone knows who’s around us
with the means to do us harm
who are kidnapped by their brain?s complexity.

Lord, please help us help the helpless
who are haunted in their minds
by the voices and the thoughts that fill their heads.
Gun laws aren’t the only answer
when the mentally deranged
victimize the unassuming till they’re dead.