In these United States: A Gratitude Poem, after all, for 2025, by Marie Cartier

Oh yes, I’m grateful for the Portland frog—that blow up adult sized character with the pink scarf blowing back in the wind facing down a squad of ICE “officers.”

I’m so grateful for all the blow-up adult size characters who showed up at the largest protest for anything, single day protest in the U.S. to shout NO KINGS!! And more—the blow-up Tiger with the sign “Fascists get scratches!” My wife inside a blow-up bear, the California bear! With a sign that said, “Yes on 50!”

And so grateful we won: yes, on 50!

Grateful, grateful, for Indivisible! Spreading like Morning Glory. Glory! Glory! Across all 50 states and feeding people, feeding children, passing out whistles – alerting communities when ICE is nearby, stopping ICE in their tracks when they are places, especially in front of schools… I mean, why are they there? (As Gertude says, “There is no there there.”)

But this is a grateful poem. A rant.

I’m grateful for the blow-up unicorn with the sign, “Honk if you are not on the Epstein list.” Dancing on the curb with the rest of us. I’m grateful for all the cars honking as they went by us and all the food donated to give to people in need—some of those in hiding since last spring when this b.s. started – this f*** bullshit– but this is a grateful poem. A rant.

And I’m grateful for all the old activists, like me, seasoned by years of the struggle “for abortion rights, marriage rights, ACTUP, women’s rights, Black Lives Matter, and more and the younger activists feeling their chops and their courage for the first time and taking leadership roles and finding that community of people who care so deeply they find their courage and fight back.

I’m grateful for everyone who says “enough is enough is enough is enough.” I’m grateful because enough is enough.

II

So, in Monrovia, California they are buying seventeen cent ice scrapers in droves like a hundred or more protesters buy seventeen cent ice scrapers (People are so creative, you know? I love that about people who protest injustice. They are so f*** creative.) And then they are returning the ice scrapers. They tie up the whole store mechanism by buying the ice scrapers and then returning them. Why ice scrapers? Because they are scraping off ICE—ICE the deportation machine that is getting the biggest budget in our “economy.” The Big, Beautiful, Bullshit Bill…. gives ICE the biggest budget! To do what? Arrest the gardener in front of Polly’s Pies? Yes, that happened here in Long Beach, California. Take out two guys washing cars around the corner, at the corner car wash? (Just happened here.) What is the danger? Gardening? Washing cars?

And they are being deported to countries some of them have not lived in for thirty years, that they never lived in as adults. They may have asylum here in the US for fear of their lives where they have citizenship. For instance, genital mutilation.

For instance…fill in the blank. Their stories, their histories waiting—maybe stories of death, torture, loss.

And we are capturing these people in their American jobs, at their homes, at parties, at celebrations. At schools. We in Long Beach, California, did not even celebrate Dia de Los Muertos for fear of ICE raids.

The Queer Mercado is empty.

Why is this happening? Why? Because there is a lot of money in people being sent to prison, and even more when they are sent to detention because of the lack of oversight.

 And there you charge $325 a day per person to hold these people in abysmal conditions and make cha-ching cha-ching off of them. Where does all the money go? They were ordered to shut down Alligator Alcatraz in Florida because of abysmal conditions, but then they re-opened it…but the conditions had not changed.

So where does all the money go? Where does all the money go? One hundred people for one month creates $910,000—where does all the money go?

We know where the money is. So much money. So, every person that is abducted/kidnapped/ captured opens up money that goes into someone’s pocket that is invested in prison culture. F*** prison culture. Prison culture is the nation’s 2^nd largest growth industry. So put your money in prisons –that’s a safe bet…and maybe even safer–there isn’t any oversight on these detention centers, as I’ve said…

You can feed/ not feed…let them sleep/ not sleep… you can just keep on not investing money in the actual prison conditions because guess what?  You can make so much money off of people – so much money.

This was supposed to be a grateful poem. A grateful rant.

So much money. Sigh.

So, I am grateful for the ICE scrapers and the Portland Frog and the Unicorn and the Tiger and the people flash mobbing in Portland and they held crotchet classes in front of the detention center and…

 I am grateful that where I live, they had, among other actions, a candle lit ceremony. A candle lit for every person taken as the City Council members walked into a meeting, and walked out – the candles lit to remind them –these are our neighbors they are taking. And they candles were so many and they formed a broken heart the City Council members had to walk through.

So, we said, take a stand for our neighbors.

I’m so grateful for all the people who fight back and I’m so grateful to be one of them. I am so very grateful to be one of the people who fight back against this f*** regime of hate. And you know what? I know, as Adreinne Rich wrote, “I have to cast my lot with those who age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.”

And so, do I. And this is where I cast my lot. With those who age after age, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.

Because this is a grateful poem. A rant.

And enough is enough is enough… is enough.

Marie Cartier

November 27- December 23, 2025