I keep waiting for this place
to prove itself worth saving.
I pace the floor imagining
I’ve missed something
redemptive, something
of the frame work that hasn’t
gone rotten. It sounds half-good
on paper, but how to separate the words
from how poisonously they’ve been used
and turned to awful ends so far — that’s
what puts the twist in my gut.
Maybe if we kill all the money
the living words will dig out from under
that pile of death. Maybe
if we drive out the magicians
all their secrets will be laid bare
and no one will be fooled again.
Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe
if the whole unbalanced tower
wasn’t built on stolen land
and labor it wouldn’t be falling
on so many right now. Maybe
it wasn’t built to stand this long,
no matter what the framers thought?
I keep waiting to find an argument
that it’s worth saving. I find
that the only person I’m arguing with
is myself, and I am losing; I can tell
by the sick joy I feel
that is starting to drown my fear.