Dan Williams

Spiraling Down part two

Preferring to bask in the bliss that ignorance creates,

everybody plays along, nobody really hates taxes enough

to stand and refuse when the collector comes around.

Or, be willing in an instant when the situation escalates,

to act as drastically as needed if the situation gets tough;

another tax collector will always easily be found.

 

This is not fantasy; this is propaganda painted on bare skin.

This is not a distant worry but will soon destroy this race of fools.

This is flock of easy victims who will not defend themselves,

our layer of protection is wearing dangerously thin.

Our old mechanics are too confused to even recognize today’s tools,

leaving only weakly smiling sheep who sweep no dust off of their shelves.

 

Loud silences that we who refuse to hear and are afraid of,

shouted commands as surely as any jesus or zeus,

that you might likely be some demented man’s unpaid lackey

chauffeuring a group of fools in procession, an idiots’ parade

in which our rows are erratic, our columns held too loose;

our lines end never knowing where our beginning was made.

 

We long winded complainers, we sheep all together unthanking,

All our brains have been safely mutated by manufactured waves,

unfortuitously demanding safety in place of freedoms.

Red lights too long ignored are mostly extinguished, few remain blinking;

this will continue till all have been brought to their knees

by saviors who have long ago forgotten what it is they are to save.

 

Once we tried to act as raised, to be gentlemen,

that dignity we have been steadfastly refused.

Taught to resign ourselves to mediocrity,

regardless of the discipline you choose.

Still, tyrants often fail to see the most dangerous of foes

can be those who now have nothing left to lose.