Poem: Unslept

 

Unslept

 

unable to focus

on the who-what-why-wheres

which ride in miniature railroad cars

clownlike in busy forebrains;

unable to write

except like a worm wet in beach sand,

erased and rolled

by the chew of the surf,

 

i decided i was nothing.

nothing but iterative muscle

clung to frail pillars

soon to collapse into a grave hole.

 

why had i imagined ethical wings?

or any sort of limbs

other than those which flail and hit

and cry and kill and break under rage?

why had i truly, foolishly,

imagined such creatures as we are,

the idiocy that is human,

shedding our hate to become flowers

with petals as quills as flight as letters as language

in a poem of caring touch?

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5/25 ... fixed typo

It's only about a third of a population of a country that embraces a fascist leader.  The Nazi Party was around 32% at its height.  But that's all it takes to menace everyone enough so they all cow and bow down--or suffer the very real consequences.