Lawrence Ferlinghetti - Pity the Nation

This is from Gibran Khalil he was a lebanese american poet

Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years
and whose strong men are yet in the cradle.
Pity the nation divided into into fragments,
each fragment deeming itself a nation.

Pity the nation that raises not its voice
save when it walks in a funeral,
boasts not except among its ruins,
and will rebel not save when its neck is laid
between the sword and the block.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox,
whose philosopher is a juggler,
and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking.
Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting,
and farewells him with hooting,
only to welcome another with trumpeting again.

Thanks, you got me to look it up :)

Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion.
Pity the nationt hat wears a cloth it does not weave,
eats a bread it does not harvest,
and drinks a wine that flows not from its own wine-press.
Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero,
and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful.
Pity a nation that despises a passion in its dream,
yet submits in its awakening.

Thanks. You got me to read the original

my pleasure! :)

i honestly never really listen to poetry, and i think some of it is just bs, but this poem has alot of truth to it

I listen, and I wonder, when will our own voices will rise up?

he said it all

He's the real laureate, in my view.