Death Dream
You were right about the end, my love. You called it. I should never have doubted that
our neighbour’s worst impulses would finally impale reason and compassion with pitchforks.
Uncle Sam was always a bit of a bully, and never my favourite, but he was still sort of family.
For years he was a roadside attractcident drawing us in despite ourselves. He was Vegas, neon
unreality, a guy with too many guns talking a big game & dropping by with deplorable friends, a
crazy, small town, big city patriot, with some beautiful dreams and a fatal attraction to nut jobs.
Knowing where it ends changes the past like learning your teacher was a child molester.
If I could do it again, I wouldn’t laugh. I wouldn’t blithely toss off the ugly as a foil for my superiority.
Now, I regret my irony, my naïve belief that progress is permanent. I regret my complacency as truth
gave way to truthiness, then accelerated into post-truth until we stared slack-jawed in disbelief.
Democracy was stolen by a clown from a nightmare so bad we haven’t even imagined it yet.
I’m afraid. America isn’t too big to fail. It’s under attack by a cheeto godzilla, as yuge as it is stupid,
crushing everything good with greed and directionless spite. Can we lucid dream our way out of
kakistocracy? Time will tell if this government by a parade of the worst people will be fascist
warmongers, a kleptocratic dictatorship, another vile variety of corruption and decaying pus or
all of the above. While tiny hands tweet death rays with weaponized Twitter, republican Jesus is
dropping bombs on the poorest and weakest. This is the American Dream. This is me waking up.
