Our Pentagon gamed all this out before
the Persian Gulf's no battlefield we'd choose.
Iranians wage asymmetric war
most simulations show we slowly lose.
Tom Jefferson refused to pay a toll
for shipping on a common route at sea
But Trump now put the Persians in control
where we had sent Marines to Tripoli.
Two hundred years, free shipping made us strong
and wealthier than Lydia of yore.
But Trump insists it's we who've got it wrong;
his cronies see more profit waging war.
What Congress hasn't weighed, turns on one man
who  manifestly hasn't got a plan

Barbary Pirates

Trump's war in Asia's setting off alarms;
the Pentagon remembers getting stuck.
Advisors all got fired who duly warned,
predictably, our servicemen get fucked.
"Advisors" Ike positioned in Saigon
then requisitioned force, by increment.
Such baleful auguries point to Iran,
where native friends are likewise impotent.
Tom Jefferson would not prevaricate;
no foreign power'd get to charge us tolls!
But Trump gave up the game in Hormuz Strait;
IRGC's now wholly in control.
Elections loom, and Teheran hangs tough
as Persian diplomats call Donald's bluff.

Rodef Dam

Orestes saw his duty, and proved true;
Elektra's orphaned by her brother's hand.
Good kids stood up to do what they must do
to purge the regicide taint from the land.
Orestes can't shrug off the family weight
Until Athena will adjudicate.
Orestes was ordained to break the spell;
Athena took him for her very own
Inventing courts to thwart the Hags of Hell.
Exiled from Mycenae, he found a home.
His father's murder cried out from the Earth.
Orestes knew what duty'd bid him do
to prove himself a pious son of worth.
but matricide's a Capital sin, too.
what could Orestes do in such a plight
he's next of kin and must avenge the king
in his dilemma, no decision's right
the best of actions consequences bring

fulminating

The host with pitchforks marches to the beat;
Bob Dylan's lyrics soaring in our throats.
When Miller's brownshirts shoot us in the streets,
We won't be begging him to let us vote.
The mob with torches owns the avenues,
when Hegseth calls our soldiers to"crusade",
a billion Muslims join with Sikhs, and Jews,
and--maybe--this is more than a parade.
"Appeal to Heaven" as Alito said
belongs to We the People, not to him.
nor to his party's venal orange head,
to honor or dishonor at his whim.
That gallows Stephen Miller raised so tall,
will hoist him high, when he's cast down this Fall.

Those who don't know history

Our admirals know well vanRiper's game;
their fleet's deployed, but still they hesitate.
Unwilling to reprise it all the same
that awful turkey-shoot queued in the Strait.
To launch a war--if Congress doesn't mind--
takes just a momentary fit of pique.
But where Trump leads, no allies march behind;
there's none to save him drowning in his Creek.
Trump's foreign venture doesn't play at home,
where memories of wars gone wrong are strong.
This New World Order, going it alone,
is judged by Right and Left alike as 'wrong"
November third, Americans can choose
to jump this ship that's foundered at Hormuz

those who don't learn from history...

The Persians saw no way to end this fast,
once aircraft carriers loomed off their coast.
But they'll have won, if they can merely last;
come January, Trump and Friends are toast.
Each line marked 'R's a loser in this race
They'd rather drill for gas and oil at home
This whole adventure's noxious to his base;
The most corrupt regime since TeapotDome.
The war he'd threatened Kamala'd embark,
Trump launched himself without a forward thought.
So cavalier, committing in the dark
We see what mid-East donors' dollars bought.
Reprising what he hadn't learned before,
America's subsiding in Trump's war.

No Deal

The Persians have pinned Trump against a wall;
they're in no rush to cede, or even bend.
Aware of midterms coming up this Fall,
and he'll pay through the nose for war to end.
They've got the world's economy in hock
and when this crisis ends, is theirs to choose.
The global orders not built for this shock;
its lifeline's been occluded at Hormuz.
Armed Serviees delivered what they're told;
it's not for them to choose which wars to wage.
Executives intent on oil and gold

bereft of strategy, act out of rage.
A war without a rationale in sight
could toll the deathknell for the rabid Right.