It’s #PoetryFriday!
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Thank you to Mary Lee at A(nother) Year of Reading for hosting our weekend roundup of poetry. Make sure to drop in and read the many protest poems, spearheaded by our very own Jone MacCulloch
I took Tanita’s challenge from last week and composed my protest poems using the sedoka form.
If I understand it correctly, a sedoka is a pair of katautas. So I’m not sure what my second poem counts as… a double sedoka? a quad-katauta? Well…no matter how you count it…it’s my protest!
anthem
Oh, say can you see
erosion of rights
as proof our flag does not fly
o’er land of the free?
Bombs, masks everywhere…
Is this still home of the brave?
©2025 Patricia J. Franz
Big Beautiful Betrayal
Once upon a time…
Gourmet meal of lies
crafted, cooked, plated as truth…
Empty calories
leave us sick, hungry,
surviving on fossil fuels…
Not one more spoonful!
We’re full; had enough!
We have the right to refuse!
No silence-spirals!
Resist twisted truths!
This emperor has no clothes!
©draft, PJF
Patricia Franz writes picture books and poetry. She believes children, dogs, and sourdough have a lot to teach us about life, joy, and wonder. She has raised two boys, four dogs, and holds a master’s degree in Theology with a focus on children’s spirituality. Patricia, her husband, her Bernese Mountain dog, Bonny, and her sourdough starter split their time between the Arizona desert and the Sierra Nevada mountains. 
Oh, I love these poems…that second poem. We have the right to refuse. Absolutely! A wonderful use of form to get your protest out.
PS. Kermit as the hear no, see no, say no evil mascot is brilliant. I love it!
“Resist twisted truths” feels like it needs to be a on t-shirt!
In case my first comment got eaten – I do enjoy the food metaphor and feel like we for sure must remember that our rights include the right of refusal!
“Big Beautiful Betrayal” indeed! Your poems are spot on. Sometimes form helps us to say what needs to be said. (And I agree with Marcie’s t-shirt idea!!)
Ooh, the food metaphor is wicked good. Plated as a gourmet meal but empty of nutrients, poisoned with lies and garnished with fossil fuels. I’m imagining a baby doing that NO face and turning away, lips locked. The right to refuse indeed!
Love both of your poems, Patricia! Yes to resisting twisted truths.
Love both poems, Patricia! Yes to resisting twisted truths.
I just read news of a protester arrested for videoing other arrests at a Home Depot & now reading your poem, an exhortation to resist, to NOT stop! It could be a song, Patricia, notes that fill us with the “gourmet meal of lies” so we sing back in a refrain! I am extending the food metaphor with that “proof” which is definitely in the pudding!
I so love the metaphor your second poem is built around. I agree that as far as that gourmet meal of lies does, we’ve had enough. Your first sedoka is powerful, especially the question it ends with. thanks for sharing these.
Oh my, Patricia, your poems are clever. I love them! Here are lines that especially spoke out to me:
erosion of rights
Is this still the home of the brave?
Gourmet meal of lies
crafted, cooked, plated as…
truth
surviving on fossil fuels
Not one more spoonful!
We’re full; had enough
Resist twisted truths! and a drum roll for your last line
This emperor has no clothes! LOL! I chuckled on this line.
Thank you for sharing your protest poems! Well done! I’m right there with you.
Wow, that second poem is powerfully truthful, and takes any appetite away. Tanita’s response of a baby’s “lips locked” says it all, thanks!
Patricia, your poems speak to me.
erosion of rights
as proof our flag does not fly
and you served up an interesting plate
Gourmet meal of lies
crafted, cooked, plated as truth…
Both poems are protest poems that I say “Write More”.
Hi Patricia, Appreciations for these potent poems AND the great image of Kermit x 3.
Like many here this weekend, the gluttony of a “Gourmet meal of lies” & all the symbolic language of your “Big Beautiful Betrayed” brings me to a full stop, in more appreciations.
The gourmet lies are making me look at food in general suspiciously, haha. The biggest lie lately is that the budget bill was “beautiful,” but in addition to all the Repub lies, there’s AI’s fake world. It’s a lot to refuse!
The clever use of allusion adds further gravitas to your poetic examples, Patricia. The dietary metaphor is so effectively presented here too. Your words of protest hit the mark incisively.
Thanks, Patricia! Your outrage and resistance, packaged into brief nuggets, fires me up!
Big, beautiful betrayal is right! This felonious emperor has never had clothes — I’ve been stunned since his first run for president that anyone could buy into his carnival barker ways.
I love your poems, Patricia. Yes to the right to refuse!