Mr. Fred's Poetry Corner: 1968, Part Three

And all over, suddenly, lots of people
Who weren’t eligible to fight,
Started to get American Flag Crazy,
And lots of people who were eligible,
To die, that is, for what we all knew by then was bullshit,
Went out into the streets to say, Hell No!
And many cities were troubled, and colleges,
And the smell of burning was everywhere,
Flags, buildings, draft cards, bras, neighborhoods.
The election suddenly became more important.
I was not a fan of President Johnson,
Now I know he wasn’t so bad, some stuff anyway,
He said, Hell No! I’m out, no way, but who then?
So many reasons to get up, and get involved.
Me? I pulled my collar up and my head down,
The cup had already passed from me,
I was just waiting for it all to be over,
But really it had hardly begun.


Over in old Europe,
The fever had caught on big time,
I read about those French students,
And saw it all on TV,
It all looked so unreal,
I thought to myself,
What are they so pissed about?
They’re French.