let me tell you about all the think pieces in my head.
they are circulating and bubbling, surfacing then submerging.
They are the last thing you and I need:
one more carefully phrased analysis of the %&+## fix we are in.
And I have several,
just waiting, gathering steam or dust or mold or I don’t know what.
Think piece upon think piece that we don’t need right now
or tomorrow or next week.
But let me say this:
If kellyanne puts her feet on the sofa while important company is over,
it doesn’t matter.
If he says ‘you people are doing amazing work’ and means it,
it doesn’t matter.
If he says ‘you people are doing amazing work’ and doesn’t mean it,
it’s what we expect
and it doesn’t matter.
Or that picture of all those grinning white men
again in expensive suits plus one white woman using thumbs up
to indicate their satisfaction at agreeing to pollute more streams more thoroughly from now on.
Seems grim.
But it doesn’t matter.
And what doesn’t matter doesn’t score change.
We can raise our eyebrows to the high heavens,
quote one official falsehood after another ALL DAY LONG and into the night,
And still it does not matter.
There is talk of blood and soil and unity because
you and I know most likely whose blood will flow,
whose soil will be lost
and that unity is for decoration.
The only honesty to be found is in the hate that rises,
the agency morale that soars,
the billions of clicks this reality show is generating
daily.
meanwhile some ridiculously wealthy men (or perhaps just one named Robert who cares a lot about what he cares about and we are definitely not in that mix)
find more avenues than they can count to
impose their narrow lily white vision of a future
we won’t want to be a part of.
If it’s too much trouble (and expense) to kill us all,
general subjugation will do.
So cleverly shackled by chains of our own making:
unlimited streams of data which belong to them
not us.
which earn them profits, but not us.
yes we will keep paying into our demise click by clickety click click while they
(the bad guys) steal our elections,
manipulate our emotions,
corrupt our media and feed us our own helplessness
in the face of white male mediocrity gone wild.
So many think pieces I might pen
to report, compare and contrast
the devastation of what is and will be.
I will spare you.
We could talk about the white male effect
which seems to explain a lot
but doesn’t account for all the white sisters who sold us out.
There’s of course this rise of extremism
among the ‘lost boys’ who have turned to Pepe and 4chan
as symbols of their defeatist indifference.
There are too many explanations
and more understanding no longer feels like a help.
I will think my piece
and save you the trouble of too many more thousands of keystrokes to decipher.
Because in contrast to all this
your time is valuable
and matters
so use it
for good.
please.
Thank you.
image: NY Public Library Digital Collections
Yes.