Back on Set

A Work in Progress
63

Back on set the situation dire

cast and crew unpaid since a new regime took power

art needs a patron should not have to cower

poverty though much-admired costs money

what were they to do stranded on a set

placed there to play parts with a mythic cast

standing in the shade awaiting their cue

ID-checking soldiers won’t let them past

I was in a cage once did good work, said Ezra

I have a horror of policeman’s helmets, said Donal

London policemen, bobbies on the beat

cops chased me on my bike for riding without a light

coming down Herne Hill in the dark from school

my father’s name was Homer, said Ezra

apt 

all on the stage were mesmerized, rapt

me grandfather was a congressman, Thaddeus Pound

they used scrip as money once in Chippewa

Falls 

that’s where Seymour Cray was from, said Donal

remembering the Halle Lab down by the river

where Steller’s jays came to a bird feeder

Pause

money is hard to spend

it’s available to lend

mortgages are scrip too

Pause

Caesar’s on his way to Rome

to cut a deal, with…

Pause

in retrospect it’s what you put in 

a deal’s made like sausage

it’s all in what’s put in…

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                        2025