John Kaprielian

LA COSA AMERICANA

We used to call it "The Mafia."

Untouchable man at the top
Capos run
criminal enterprises
insinuate themselves
everywhere
funnel money
up the chain

Extortion
Bribery
Blackmail
Money laundering
Sex trafficking

Bent cops and thugs
do the enforcing
corrupt lawyers and judges
keep everyone out of jail

Get out of line
get in their way
guys in black masks
throw you in a van and
you are "disappeared"

This is also
an accurate description
of the current Administration.

Government?
No. Organized crime.


John's YouTube reading of "La Cosa Americana"


John confesses: "This poem grew directly from a comment I made online, where I said I felt like the current administration was behaving more like a crime syndicate than a government, doing all the stuff "Organized Crime" is notorious for. The parallels were too close not to try to write a poem about it."

Now retired from a career as a natural history photo editor and a digital asset librarian, JOHN KAPRIELAN has been writing poetry for over 4 decades. He brings his keen eye for natural history and a progressive point of view to many of his poems. He studied creative writing at Cornell with the poet A.R. Ammons while getting his undergraduate degree in Russian Linguistics, and holds a Masters in Information and Library Science from the University at Buffalo. He has been published in Minute Magazine, The Blue Nib, Young Ravens Literary Review, Poetry Quarterly, What Rough Beast, and many other journals, and has a poetry collection available through Amazon.