AT THE READING
the poets are gathered
in the auditorium
make the final checks
to see nothing wrong
with their uniforms
doped and dragooned
the audience
off-loaded from trucks
are marched to
their seats
essence
of the system
one attendee
one seat
was the promise decades
prior that won
the landslide election
whose benefeciaries are
here too
armour-plated limousines
as
gatekeepers of
fine standing
Ah what
a sight!
same old same old
every poem
basically the same
so
no sense
in expectation
indeed
best thing that could happen
before a line is recited
a stanza
is read
is that something
from smallest inconvenient
hitch
to extinction level event
stops everything in
its tracks
temporary reprieve
or a long long wait
a few million years
to the cockroaches that
survived
and evolved
get their act together
to run a better, more
poetic,
democratic
and yes,
human event
poems 2 die for 