Reykjavik, where Reagan
and Gorbachev almost agreed
to ban all nuclear weapons.
Gorbachev, an old man now,
maintains that this dream
is humanity’s only hope.
The shelling of civilians
is indiscriminate. The situation
has gone far beyond insults,
invective, rhetoric.
Forty years on
I’ll concede that avuncular
rightwinger Ronnie Reagan,
bete noire of all 80s lefties,
was correct. Despite
glasnost and perestroika,
this empire really is evil,
paranoiac, toxic.
Thanks for your comments, Keith and Steve, and for your Like, K.Lynn. I'm afraid that Gorbachev's death is a sobering and deeply symbolic moment.
Thank you, Greg. A timely reminder of how things are going backwards in Russia. So sad to see a great country and civilization being dragged down like this, but even sadder for the people of Ukraine who are faced with the consequences.
The glimmer of hope offered by people like Gorbachev is being snuffed out.
Greg,
well said as you sum up the tragedy which took place 22 years ago when all the good work that was achieved by Gorbachev regressed into another empire of evil under the serial killer Putin. With Reagan we were filled with such hope of a peaceful future. Now we are in a situation far worse than the Cold War.
Thank you for reminding us in this poem of how we reached this awful place.
Keith
Re-posted from early March this year to mark the death of Mikhail Gorbachev, a great Russian, who tried to make the world a safer place.
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john short
Sat 17th Sep 2022 11:22
Hi Greg
I generally agree. Someone as dangerous as Putin should have been handled with kid gloves however, the situation has been made worse by American foreign policy. Refusing his application to join NATO all those years ago was probably not a good move for a start.
John S