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My Father
by rade Monday, Aug 19 2013, 1:59pm
international / poetry / post

the aristocrat
a useless drunk that time overtook
no more privileges or airs
only communist revolutionaries
threatening his throat,
and my future birth
stealing the (my) Estate

it’s all gone now
the Balkans tore itself apart soon after
but records of my stolen Estate
remain in the city archives

how many generations
did our family lord over the Estate
and the peasants that slaved
for our luxury and ease?

how many indentured families toiled
so my father could drink himself
to oblivion and gamble
our masterpieces -- the remainder disappeared
with Nazi occupation?

but we redeemed our nation
and our Estate
the peasants fought like
ancient Serbs, fearless
and for the first time in generations
the noble blood
of warriors that founded our lineage
saw my my father and uncles
fight like our warrior ancestors

but it was short-lived
the war ended, we were victorious
i daren’t say what our forces did
to Nazi occupiers,
the hate is evident today
Germany did everything in its power
to destroy Serbia in the Balkan wars
and failed, as did the U.S.
they have no idea

we are warriors, poets
visionaries and drunks in that order
so i fight today
against the vile civilian killing
star-spangled fascist scum
that occupies our heartland
and wreaks havoc on the world

their time is counted in days

time overtook my father
whose only legacy to me after
escaping the communists was to instill
a loathing for the bourgeoisie
‘someone has to do the books,’ he often said
with utter contempt,
he detested their petty anal values

sure that I would carry on,
a man at ten, he blew his brains out,
a Serbian obsession/obligation --
only the Japanese have a similar
suicidal ritual when confronted
with abject failure

it is better that a warrior take his own life
than live like a dog or worse
in a society dominated by bourgeois values

but i am the living next generation
unaffected by the self-obsessed
middle-class with its regulations,
anal constraints, pretensions
and anxieties

my son will follow after me until
the American fascists are driven
from our land and off the face of the earth
such is the pledge our nobility
makes to all our enemies

today i write poetry, fight and get drunk
i am proficient in all three arts

victory is assured, i see our nation's
entire history in my son’s
eyes, sturdy arms and thighs

our lineage is secured
our blood-soaked land waits
patiently for our return