by Jane Rosenberg LaForge
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AI-generated graphic by Shutterstock for The New Verse News. |
Fascism will seem inevitable long after
it arrives, or perhaps it’s the waiting
for fascism that is inescapable; you
anticipate the pristine, diamond-fast,
inconvertible moment of its advent
like it’s Jesus, beveled and prismatic,
a milestone through which we’ll channel
every event of your circumscribed life.
Where were you, your grandchildren
will ask, when coffee began to taste
off, fruits rotted faster, the lustrous effects
of oysters were outlawed because the flesh
offended the tongue of the great leader
with a nano-speck of sand as though he
possessed the sensitivity of a prince asleep
on a mattress supported on the backs
of loyal constituents, or because of his
unnatural disgust for the aboriginal environment.
What if we applied the same terminology
for fascists that we reserve for drug addicts,
a population jonesing for an authoritative
figure who will lead them by the nose
to their next hit, rush, or fix, of being
totally dominated? You should be open
with your children about your past drug
use, but not your present prescriptions,
nor your plan of ditching your citizenship
while you wait out fascism in a foreign
nation, surreptitiously monitoring a
short-wave radio you pieced together
from bits and bobs of old door posts,
vacuum cleaners and military regalia.
Someday we might look back at this
interregnum with a glazed fascination,
although there’s no guarantee it will pass,
considering we no longer have communal
experiences, only niche encounters shared
among an ever-tightening cadre of familiars,
like certain therapies or twisting the knife
once it’s sunk into the rose of the bone,
the sound of incursion is ever more gratifying.
it arrives, or perhaps it’s the waiting
for fascism that is inescapable; you
anticipate the pristine, diamond-fast,
inconvertible moment of its advent
like it’s Jesus, beveled and prismatic,
a milestone through which we’ll channel
every event of your circumscribed life.
Where were you, your grandchildren
will ask, when coffee began to taste
off, fruits rotted faster, the lustrous effects
of oysters were outlawed because the flesh
offended the tongue of the great leader
with a nano-speck of sand as though he
possessed the sensitivity of a prince asleep
on a mattress supported on the backs
of loyal constituents, or because of his
unnatural disgust for the aboriginal environment.
What if we applied the same terminology
for fascists that we reserve for drug addicts,
a population jonesing for an authoritative
figure who will lead them by the nose
to their next hit, rush, or fix, of being
totally dominated? You should be open
with your children about your past drug
use, but not your present prescriptions,
nor your plan of ditching your citizenship
while you wait out fascism in a foreign
nation, surreptitiously monitoring a
short-wave radio you pieced together
from bits and bobs of old door posts,
vacuum cleaners and military regalia.
Someday we might look back at this
interregnum with a glazed fascination,
although there’s no guarantee it will pass,
considering we no longer have communal
experiences, only niche encounters shared
among an ever-tightening cadre of familiars,
like certain therapies or twisting the knife
once it’s sunk into the rose of the bone,
the sound of incursion is ever more gratifying.
Jane Rosenberg LaForge is the author of a memoir, two novels, four full-length collections of poetry, and four chapbooks of poetry. She lives in New York, yearns for her hometown of Los Angeles, and visits Las Vegas when Dead and Co. plays there.
