A Thanksgiving Prayer

A Thanksgiving Prayer

after Burroughs

like a bird on a wire

like a drunk in the midnight choir

I have tried all my life

to be free

Leonard Cohen

“Thanks for the Wild Turkey and
the passenger pigeons

destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts

Thanks for a continent a world to despoil and poison”

Thanks for Blacks, Jews, Hispanics, Asians, Middle Easterners

Homosexuals, Lesbians, Lost, Beat, Hippie, Punk X Storm

All the Outsider Generations Smart Women Smart Women

The sad, downtrodden, stepped on, walked on, kicked and killed

to provide a modicum of challenge, danger and entertainment

“Thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin

leaving the carcasses to rot”

depriving the Native Americans of food shelter and clothing

Thanks for murdering 90% of the people

who lived here before we arrived from Europe

Thanks for stealing all of this Great America

from the Native Americans

and killing most of them

and treating the rest worse than dogs

Thanks for stealing Blacks from Africa

and making them slaves

and treating them worse than dogs

and using their forced labor

to make America Great for the first time

“Thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes”

Thanks for Oil and The War on Climate Change

Thanks for The War on Truth

“Thanks for the American Dream of Equality for Everyone

to vulgarize, to falsify until the bare lies shine through”

“Thanks for the KKK”, for neo-Nazis and for a new secret NSA, FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, ICE

fear-based government that is dismantling

our Bill of Rights and protecting us by increasing

brutal censorship by listening to our every conversation

by keeping eyes on us around the clock

by imprisoning thousands of children

by murdering immigrants and dissenters

Thanks for the trigger happy lawmen protecting whites

“Thanks for decent church-goin’ men and women

with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces”

who don’t understand that Jesus never killed nobody

who don’t understand that Jesus didn’t have a gun

who don’t understand that there’s

only One Commandment not 10

who don’t understand what the hell it really means to be a Christian

who don’t understand The Beatitudes

“Thanks for “Kill a Queer for Christ” bumper stickers

Thanks for laboratory AIDS

Thanks for Prohibition” and
the War On Drugs

“Thanks for a country where nobody’s allowed

to mind their own business

Thanks for a nation of” snitches

Thanks for filling the prisons with young, black men

with men and women of all colors who smoke marijuana

for building new prisons and filling them too

so corporations can continue to have slave labor

Thanks for a government that has sold us

to Russia, Saudi Arabia and China

a government that is One Big Lie

Yes, Thanks for all the memories

“Thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of

the last and greatest of human dreams”

—Ron Whitehead, with special thanks to
my friend William S. Burroughs

This article appears in November 26, 2019.

Do you have a news tip?

SEND A NEWS TIP

Subscribe to LEO Weekly Newsletters

Sign up. We hope you like us, but if you don't, you can unsubscribe by following the links in the email, or by dropping us a note at leo@leoweekly.com.

Signup

• Weekly Top Stories
• Red Pin Tix: Upcoming Events
• Promotions and Deals
• Food & Drink Newsletter
• Things To Do in Louisville
• LEO Weekly Press Club
• LEO Daily

Sign up

By clicking “subscribe” above, you consent to allow us to contact you via email, and store your information using our third-party Service Provider. To see more information about how your information is stored and privacy protected, visit our policies page.

Subscribe to LEO Weekly Newsletters

Sign up. We hope you like us, but if you don't, you can unsubscribe by following the links in the email, or by dropping us a note at leo@leoweekly.com.

To sign up now, enter your email address in the field below and click the Subscribe button.

By clicking “Subscribe” above, you consent to allow us to contact you via email, and store your information using our third-party Service Provider. To see more information about how your information is stored and privacy protected, visit our policies page.