There was the smell of blood,
broken hearts and dying dreams
in the air when Americans
began to lose their jobs
and were foreclosed on.
The money, they said, had vanished
into the maw of the financial "crisis"
created so banks could suck up billions
in 401Ks, mutual and pension funds
in addition to the taxpayer bailout
and regurgitate it into the mint julep glasses
of CEOs and shareholders fanning themselves
while sitting on the financial plantation's veranda,
living off the retirement
of the Middle and Working Classes,
and in the deep, dead of financial winter
will drink hot toddies and imported brandy
while wrapped in cashmere sweaters
by the comforting fire
of their remote and casual brutality.
