• Submit Poetry
  • Support SCP
  • About Us
  • Members
  • Join
Saturday, October 4, 2025
Society of Classical Poets
  • Poems
    • Beauty
    • Culture
    • Satire
    • Humor
    • Children’s
    • Art
    • Ekphrastic
    • Epic
    • Epigrams and Proverbs
    • Human Rights in China
    • Music
    • Performing Arts
    • Riddles
    • Science
    • Song Lyrics
    • The Environment
    • The Raven
    • Found Poems
    • High School Poets
    • Terrorism
    • Covid-19
  • Poetry Forms
    • Sonnet
    • Haiku
    • Limerick
    • Villanelle
    • Rondeau
    • Pantoum
    • Sestina
    • Triolet
    • Acrostic
    • Alexandroid
    • Alliterative
    • Blank Verse
    • Chant Royal
    • Clerihew
    • Rhupunt
    • Rondeau Redoublé
    • Rondel
    • Rubaiyat
    • Sapphic Verse
    • Shape Poems
    • Terza Rima
  • Great Poets
    • Geoffrey Chaucer
    • Emily Dickinson
    • Homer
    • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    • Dante Alighieri
    • John Keats
    • John Milton
    • Edgar Allan Poe
    • William Shakespeare
    • William Wordsworth
    • William Blake
    • Robert Frost
  • Love Poems
  • Contests
  • SCP Academy
    • Educational
    • Teaching Classical Poetry—A Guide for Educators
    • Poetry Forms
    • The SCP Journal
    • Books
No Result
View All Result
Society of Classical Poets
  • Poems
    • Beauty
    • Culture
    • Satire
    • Humor
    • Children’s
    • Art
    • Ekphrastic
    • Epic
    • Epigrams and Proverbs
    • Human Rights in China
    • Music
    • Performing Arts
    • Riddles
    • Science
    • Song Lyrics
    • The Environment
    • The Raven
    • Found Poems
    • High School Poets
    • Terrorism
    • Covid-19
  • Poetry Forms
    • Sonnet
    • Haiku
    • Limerick
    • Villanelle
    • Rondeau
    • Pantoum
    • Sestina
    • Triolet
    • Acrostic
    • Alexandroid
    • Alliterative
    • Blank Verse
    • Chant Royal
    • Clerihew
    • Rhupunt
    • Rondeau Redoublé
    • Rondel
    • Rubaiyat
    • Sapphic Verse
    • Shape Poems
    • Terza Rima
  • Great Poets
    • Geoffrey Chaucer
    • Emily Dickinson
    • Homer
    • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    • Dante Alighieri
    • John Keats
    • John Milton
    • Edgar Allan Poe
    • William Shakespeare
    • William Wordsworth
    • William Blake
    • Robert Frost
  • Love Poems
  • Contests
  • SCP Academy
    • Educational
    • Teaching Classical Poetry—A Guide for Educators
    • Poetry Forms
    • The SCP Journal
    • Books
No Result
View All Result
Society of Classical Poets
No Result
View All Result
Home Poetry Culture

‘Folk Heroes’: A Poem by Warren Bonham

May 31, 2025
in Culture, Poetry
A A
5

.

Folk Heroes

We’re told to laud our new folk heroes,
but they’re made up by woke zeroes.
always stirring up commotion
led, not by facts, but by emotion.

MS13 will dismember,
all except for one lone member,
who the mainstream news reported
was too good to be deported.

His wife said she lived in terror,
but now claims that was an error.
He’s a husband and great father
who only a fiend would ever bother.

Kilmar’s just the latest sainted,
but, there are more we’re acquainted
with who are called mighty pillars,
although they’re just thugs and killers.

Kilmar, Dzhokhar, and Luigi
should be rated R, not PG.
They’re thugs needing condemnation,
they’re not heroes of our nation.

.

Poet’s Note: Some people ignore the victims of crimes perpetrated by vicious thugs and killers (the murder of Laken Riley is a recent glaring example) but love to transform those thugs into mythic folk heroes. The uproar around illegal-alien criminals who are being rounded up and deported is just the most recent example. The list of those unjustifiably sainted is too long to list, but it includes Kilmar Abrego Garcia (illegal immigrant and MS 13 gang member), Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (Boston Marathon bomber), and Luigi Mangioni (alleged killer of the CEO of United Healthcare).

.

.

Warren Bonham is a private equity investor who lives in Southlake, Texas.

ShareTweetPin
The Society of Classical Poets does not endorse any views expressed in individual poems or commentary.
Read Our Comments Policy Here
Next Post
‘Still Life of a Bouquet’: A Poem by Joanna Raja Sekar

'Still Life of a Bouquet': A Poem by Joanna Raja Sekar

‘To a Virginia Bluebell’ and Other Poetry by Lee Evans

'To a Virginia Bluebell' and Other Poetry by Lee Evans

‘Productivity’ and Other Poetry by Rita Dubman

'Two Love Poems' by James A. Tweedie

Comments 5

  1. Roy Eugene Peterson says:
    4 months ago

    Exactly! Worthy of condemnation only not sainthood as the media seems to make them!

    Reply
  2. Brian Yapko says:
    4 months ago

    Terrific poem, Warren. Much needed perspective. George Floyd belongs on this list. And I would add Mahmoud Khalil — darling of every murderous antisemite who thinks that calls for Jewish genocide constitute free speech. In other words, the type of brainless woke student now typical of Columbia and Harvard. If Greta Thunberg incited murder she’d be even more popular than she is now. Of course, her hypocritical shift from ecological to anti-Israel concerns may already fit that bill.

    There’s something really sick in the soul of people who applaud murderous vile criminals as “folk heroes.” Something shifted in the 20th Century. Common folk rooted for Bonnie & Clyde. In Mexico, many people loved Pancho Villa. And we often hear stories of how some strange people send love letters and fan mail to convicted murderers in prison. This is not like writing a tribute to Robin Hood. It’s more like glorifying Heinrich Himmler or Pol Pot.

    I looked up John Wilkes Boothe. He was universally condemned for assassinating President Lincoln even though the country was even more divided than it is now and he was reviled by the Confederacy. In the 19th Century people still had a moral compass. Something sick has shifted in the West’s soul.

    And now? I can’t count the number of young people I’ve seen wearing Che Guevara T-shirts in the last 20 years.

    Reply
    • Dave Whippman says:
      4 months ago

      I agree 100%, Brian. There’s a profound sickness in a society that worships the likes of Thunberg and the other trendy woke Israel-haters. But then, how popular are they really? Or is it just the “elite” few shouting loudest?

      Reply
  3. Joseph S. Salemi says:
    4 months ago

    History is filled with moral vermin who somehow became folk heroes. There were Ravachol and the Marquis de Sade in France, and nihilist radicals and Communists in Russia who were worshiped by the left-liberal bourgeoisie (Solzhenitsyn makes much of this phenomenon in his historical studies of the pre-revolutionary period). In America we had Sacco and Vanzetti, Jesse James, Billy the Kid, George Jackson of the Soledad Brothers, the Weathermen terrorists, Che Guevara, and most recently that piece of garbage named George Floyd. Many of these creeps have been honored as if they were canonized saints. You’ll even find some left-liberals who still have good things to say about the Reverend Jim Jones and the People’s Temple.

    Let’s be perfectly honest about left-liberals. They simply get wet in the crotch for criminal activists and political revolutionaries who defy social norms. Look at the frantic outcries that have gone up from leftists when our government has tried to expel violent South American gang members.

    Reply
  4. Margaret Coats says:
    4 months ago

    Warren, I’m amused by your purposeful rhyme of “heroes” with “zeroes.” In French, students are warned about proper pronunciation of “h,” because if they are careless, “les zeros” can result when speaking of heroes. You speak rather of errors in judgment. They are sad ones indeed.

    I hope you are well, as we seem to have missed you recently!

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

  1. BDW on ‘And These Two Despots Smile’ and Other Poetry by Bruce Dale WiseOctober 3, 2025

    Here is the quatrain to which Ms. Coats refers The grisly act, this horrid fact, more blood has now been…

  2. Warren Bonham on ‘J.K. Rowling’s Response to the Assassination of Charlie Kirk’: A Poem by Warren BonhamOctober 3, 2025

    I hadn't thought about Rowling for many years and then in a short period of time, I came across her…

  3. Warren Bonham on ‘J.K. Rowling’s Response to the Assassination of Charlie Kirk’: A Poem by Warren BonhamOctober 3, 2025

    I'm not sure if you saw her brilliant comment about Malcolm Gladwell that preceded this one (September 5th on X).…

  4. Warren Bonham on ‘J.K. Rowling’s Response to the Assassination of Charlie Kirk’: A Poem by Warren BonhamOctober 3, 2025

    JK is a great role model in that she has remained steadfast despite being cancelled by pretty much everyone she…

  5. Warren Bonham on ‘J.K. Rowling’s Response to the Assassination of Charlie Kirk’: A Poem by Warren BonhamOctober 3, 2025

    I'm very glad you enjoyed this one! Rowling obviously has a way with words. I think she nailed it with…

Facebook Twitter Youtube

Archive

Categories

Quick Links

  • About Us
  • Submit Poetry
  • Become a Member
  • Members List
  • Support the Society
  • Advertisement Placement
  • Comments Policy
  • Terms of Use

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Poems
    • Beauty
    • Culture
    • Satire
    • Humor
    • Children’s
    • Art
    • Ekphrastic
    • Epic
    • Epigrams and Proverbs
    • Human Rights in China
    • Music
    • Performing Arts
    • Riddles
    • Science
    • Song Lyrics
    • The Environment
    • The Raven
    • Found Poems
    • High School Poets
    • Terrorism
    • Covid-19
  • Poetry Forms
    • Sonnet
    • Haiku
    • Limerick
    • Villanelle
    • Rondeau
    • Pantoum
    • Sestina
    • Triolet
    • Acrostic
    • Alexandroid
    • Alliterative
    • Blank Verse
    • Chant Royal
    • Clerihew
    • Rhupunt
    • Rondeau Redoublé
    • Rondel
    • Rubaiyat
    • Sapphic Verse
    • Shape Poems
    • Terza Rima
  • Great Poets
    • Geoffrey Chaucer
    • Emily Dickinson
    • Homer
    • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    • Dante Alighieri
    • John Keats
    • John Milton
    • Edgar Allan Poe
    • William Shakespeare
    • William Wordsworth
    • William Blake
    • Robert Frost
  • Love Poems
  • Contests
  • SCP Academy
    • Educational
    • Teaching Classical Poetry—A Guide for Educators
    • Poetry Forms
    • The SCP Journal
    • Books

© 2025 SCP. WebDesign by CODEC Prime.

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.