Remember that song that claimed,
“…you don’t need a weatherman
to know which way
the wind blows?”
Maybe that was true
once upon a time.
Now we don’t trust ourselves
to know what we know or don’t know.
Nothing goes down smoothly.
Nothing safely quenches our thirst
and no forecaster or fact checker
can say anything
without someone
calling it a lie.
Every expert’s a liar from birth,
their lies bought and paid for
by someone
who lies to thrive.
Your opinion is
the only truth you can trust.
It’s a north wind to you,
a south wind to the next guy.
Both of you are wrong
for in fact it is a westerly breeze
because I said it was
and neither the Tea Party nor Obama
can change my mind;
it’s certain that one of them controls
the majority of stock
in compasses. In fact,
it’s entirely possible that direction itself
is an Illuminati plot
to make us think we can get
somewhere else from here.
I just thought of that.
It must be true. It is as good a reason
as any to explain
why we’re all just standing still.
“The pump don’t work
’cause the vandals took the handles.”
Parched, paralyzed,
in fact parched nearly unto death,
thirsty for one sip of truth,
mistrusting each other, fearing
there’s no point in taking even one step
in any of those dishonest directions
because there’s no place
any different from this one,
no place without liars, leaders,
or parking meters. Seeing us now,
you’d think no sailor had ever set out
on nothing but trust in wind,
stars, hope,
and a bucket in which to catch the rain.
