Tenth-grade English students at Hartwick-Ladora-Victor in Iowa were subjected to more indoctrination. All year we’ve seen story after story from Iowa schools — rural and urban — of teachers using education for indoctrination.
At H-L-V, students were given an assignment with the poem “Your God” by Rudy Francisco.
The poem states:
“To the man standing on the corner holding the sign that said
“God hates faggots.”
I’ve never seen,
exactly
who it is that you paperclip your knees,
meld your hands together and pray to
But I think I know what he looks like:
I bet your God is about 5’10”.
I bet he weighs 185.
Probably stands the way a high school diploma does when it’s next to a GED.
I bet your god has a mullet.
I bet he wears flannel shirts with no sleeves,
a fanny pack
and says words like “getrdun.”
I bet your god—I bet your god—I bet your god watches FOX news,
Dog the Bounty Hunter, voted for John McCain, and loves Bill O’Reilly.
I bet your god lives in Arizona.
I bet his high school served racism in the cafeteria
and offered “hate speech” as a second language.
I bet he has a swastika inside of his throat,
and racial slurs tattooed to his tongue
just to make intolerance more comfortable in his mouth.
I bet he has a burning cross as a middle finger and Jim Crow underneath his nails.
conceived on a day when the sky decided to slice her own wrists,
I bet your god has a drinking problem.
I bet he sees the bottom of the shot glass more often than his own children.
I bet he pours whiskey on his dreams until they taste like good ideas,
Probably cusses like an electric guitar with Tourette’s plugged into an ocean.
I bet he yells like a schizophrenic nail gun,
damaging all things that care about him enough to get close.
I bet there are angels in Heaven with black eyes and broken halos
who claimed they fell down the stairs.
I bet your god would’ve made Eve without a mouth
and taught her how to spread her legs like a magazine
that she will never ever ever be pretty enough to be in.
Sooner or later you will realize that you are praying to your own shadow,
that you are standing in front of mirrors and are worshipping your own reflection.
Your God stole my god’s identity and I bet he’s buying pieces of heaven on eBay.
So next time you bend your knees,
next time you bow your head
I want you to
tell your god—
that my god
is looking for him.”
Some of the reaction:
“What class could this have possibly come out of, and for what reason?”
“That’s crazy.”
“What the hell is going on in that school? That is insane.”
“I am flabbergasted.”
“That is so wrong and crazy!”
“This is so inappropriate on so many levels and can’t be tolerated.”
The Iowa Standard contacted the superintendent’s office, but Carol said everyone was “tied up.” She did say she had seen the poem.
