December 3, 2020

Transition Heartache

by Stephen F. Eisenman

Transition Heartache
(With apologies to Billie Holiday)

Transition heartache, president-elect
Transition heartache, you’re the one Obama sent
I hoped and I prayed, that you’d win the day
But now that you’re here, my love’s gone ‘way

With Blinkin and Haines, more warships and drones
With Kerry there’s oil, and more fracking I moan,
Now every day, I read the Times and am blue
Transition heartache, what’s new?

Stop failing me now
Can’t take it no how
Just throw me a bone
Give Sanders a drive
At Labor he’d thrive

Transition heartache, president-elect
Transition heartache, you’re the one Obama sent
I hoped and I prayed, that you’d win the day
But now that you’re here, my love’s gone ‘way’

Stephen F. Eisenman is Professor Emeritus of Art History at Northwestern University and the author of Gauguin’s Skirt (Thames and Hudson, 1997), The Abu Ghraib Effect (Reaktion, 2007), The Cry of Nature: Art and the Making of Animal Rights (Reaktion, 2015) and other books. He is also co-founder of the environmental justice non-profit,  Anthropocene Alliance. He and the artist Sue Coe have just published American Fascism, Still for Rotland Press. He can be reached at: s-eisenman@northwestern.edu