I Like Ike
(or A Real Old Person Talking Politics to an Imaginary Much Younger Person)
When I was your age
the subway cost fifteen cents
gas cost thirty-two cents a gallon
television was free
& so was Saturday confession
in preparation for Sunday communion
when I was your age
the Giants & Dodgers played home games in New York
& hockey goalies didn’t hide behind
scary-angry grotesque Marvelesque masks
& neither did elected & selected Republicans
because they were also republicans & reputable too
& the Republican/republican popular president
had been a five-star star
of a real reality show — the definitive blockbuster —
ratings went through the roof
it was called the D-Day invasion
& the bloody siege liberated Europe
from radical right-wing egomaniacal whack jobs.
When I was your age
(now don’t get me wrong we didn’t live in Utopia — no — far from it)
but hockey goalies didn’t wear masks
& elected & selected Republicans (while not exactly woke)
didn’t hide behind an antebellum anti-republic
bloody boorish bullying cult of personality dysfunction.