POLL AUTOMATION

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago


My country has always been a den of thieves and crooks
A den of poll cheaters likewise who’d feign no mercy
In the use of guns, goons, gold, glitches

Our polls for over a century have been
Through ballots and manual counting of hands
Even the dead were known to cast vote
While many occasions of vote buying
Spiced up later with ballot snatching
Peppered with hundreds of ambushed dead
Polling has become a cheap enterprise
Subject of guffaws of a million buffoons

Till finally this year 2010
Across the archipelago our eyes were gladdened
As poll machines appeared at last in the precints
Where our folks cast their votes like enthused kids
Gleefully amazed finally at the rapid result
Churning numbers as fast as grand rapids
Finally we’d say justice had come to our polls
As the numbers we can now believably say
Is truthful enough to merit our golden valuation

[Philippines, 22 May 2010]

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COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
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ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]