Chicago

(With Apologies to Carl Sandburg, but not to Chicago's City Council or those who helped elect them.)

FEEL Gooder for the World,
Rule Maker, Puffer of Heat,
Planner of Menus and the Nation's Child Minder;
Stormy, huffy, bawling,
City of the Big Brothers: 5

They tell me you are meddling and I believe them, for I have seen your alder-(wo)men order the food joints to cease the fois-gras.
And they tell me you are weak-kneed and I answer: Yes, it is true I have seen the pusher deal and go free to deal again.
And they tell me you are prissy and my reply is: On the Council's agenda and wish-list I have seen the end of fast-food chicken.
And having answered so I turn once more to those who shrug at this lost city, and I give them back the shrug and say to them:
Come and show me another city with open mouth breathing so prone to take the yoke and whip and goad and halter. 10
Casting electric curses amid the polls and voting law on law, here is a blue state sucker set vivid against the little red cities;
Doomed as a dog with tongue lapping for glycol, fearsome as Quixote tilting against the windmills,
Thickheaded,
Posturing,
Scheming, 15
Planning,
Framing, shrieking, reframing,
Outlawed the smoke, can't talk on his cell, passing laws -- with teeth,
Fearing the terrible remnants of freedom, voting like a dead man votes,
Voting even as an ignorant toady votes who has yet to lose his freedom, 20
Pouting and preening, that all the unwashed are in check. And under his thumb, the will of the people,
Passing!
Passing the trendy, hasty, silly laws of the Proles, half-baked, glist'ning, proud to be Feel Gooder for the World, Rule Maker, Puffer of Heat, Planner of Menus and Child Minder of the Nation.

-- CAV