The Last Dispatch
David A. Streit, Election Poet | June 2

Provincial contingency poem
in the likelihood that I have been banished north
for crimes against campaigners

All right fine
Watch me butter all five sides of the bread
Well, make that four

Congratulations comrades
I knew that the people would rise up
The People's Republic of Manitoba has a nice ring to it
As minister of poetical propaganda I promise to do my duty
With glory I go, a true people's poet
A statue of Milton Acorn on every corner

But the green have momentum
Ten years from now
I might regret my political missteps

Go green or go home
That’s what I always say
Recycle all those old political ideals
Ban the cars and dig up the concrete streets
Barefoot we walk downtown
As giant windmills sit atop office buildings
Literally sky scraping power from above

Practically safe,
…better butter those last three bases

Gee whiz Jon,
I never listened to a word
from all of those smarmy political analysts
Yeah, they never saw it comin’

Anyway

Uh.…Stu
You know that I was behind you
WAY way way waaaaay behind you
I was there…honest
You proved to the province’s young
that you can be hip in a square party
“Not just business as usual”
And you were right
Right on the money

And Gary,
What can I say?
What should I say?
Please get back to me!

But you know what they say
never assume
it only makes an ass out of you and me

And if all else fails,
I hear that Crosby Stills and Nash
are looking for a new road manager
four years later
you’ll be a mean lean campaigning machine

I promise.