Children can teethe on their toys
in Ralph Nader’s America
they play in the street
go biking to the park
drink from the creek
and every car has seatbelts
air bags and side impact beams
the vehicles run on electricity
but people prefer to bike
parents work single jobs
full time or part-time hours
matters not because no matter what
workers earn a living wage
Ralph Nader’s America is a place
of basic decency
people do not litter
because single use plastics
are unnecessary
everyone has time to tarry
to sit and dine Norman Rockwell style
with their families where nothing and no one
is deemed disposable
While not everyone gets along
in Nader’s America
(people, of course, are still people)
there are ample places to air grievances
block, village, town, and city meetings
where the quality of discussion
reflects a citizenry informed
and literate as
election day is a holiday
with the ledgers and the books
the documents and memos
all interdepartmental governmental and corporate
communications remaining un-redacted and available upon request
having been written in a language that reflects
entities staffed by ordinary citizens
This is Nader’s America: a vast polis.