Candidate from the Ocean

I rambled to the ocean this morning.

Waves rolled gray and white.

The husky brought me a stick.

I played before work.

That’s where I am now,

my classroom, before the show.

My job, a high school teacher.

The Republican Convention unfolded last night.

I read the news today.

There wasn’t one person in attendance

who cared about the ocean.

How do I know that?

If any delegate cared about the ocean,

they wouldn’t have been in Tampa,

frothing in a hall

of fears and fantasy

of farmed salmon,

fake empathy,

of a God that never created the ocean.

“Phonies” Holden would have called them.

I say let the ocean hold its own political convention,

undersea,

at the thermal vents where tube worms writhe,

choose a candidate for President,

a blue whale perhaps, a keyhole limpet, kelp,

coral—

no, a manatee!

The party of water,

uniting us all,

a platform of salt and gills, walking upright.

Think of the press conference.

In the general election,

every creature gets the franchise.

Plankton too!

Think of the landslide!

Then we’ll inaugurate the manatee and her vice president the stingray,

and start that new country up.

The majorities of the deep in Congress will pass all the laws.

The scaly Supreme Court will uphold them.

For once the currency will look cool.

We’ll have a humpback whale sing the national anthem,

floating upside down,

after he spits out Steve Bannon.

We won’t need another election after this one.