On what mountain does he stand, that he can see so far?

Is he near his angels and his God, that their counsel is his only guide?

Or does he stand in some dark trough, his eyes turned only inward

on the slate of his invention, writ so large and permanent

that no fact, no reality can change the sight before him,

no movie plays out but one he watches, over and over,

the mantra of his vision, a twist of what is there,

a drama with the end his mother gave him, a moral that his whiskey

racked out and left lying like a dead animal on the street,

but seen as some false redemption he might use

to fool us into believing he is a real human,

with a real heart and an honest mind?

He goes before us, standing tall like Alexander in Persia,

marching from his trough and cave, but marching in place,

a wind-up toy of a person, grinning and pointing his righteous finger

into the eye of fact and reality, like trying to thrust a hand

into the eye of the sun without getting burned – it can’t be done.

The lies pile up like corpses on the plain,

and the corpses pile up like lies, and soon we cannot tell the difference,

there are the corpses, hidden by decree, and the lies hidden

by management of facts by his sycophants standing in the wings

like vultures pretending to be doves; like disease

pretending to be nurses; like fungus pretending to be flowers.

He will fall, like Icarus, his wings singed by the light of truth.

But when will this fall occur? In a day, a year, a four years?

Will he remain hidden in his trough, feet stuck in the mire

of his absurd self deception, churning out his black decrees

like writing so many bad checks against the account we all must pay?

Or will we rise up, a legion of truth-telling, reality- seeking organisms,

becoming the lymphocytes who can fight the invaders and defeat them?

How hard to tell us this, that in our hands resides the means,

how hard to muster the courage to say what is wrong,

that it is wrong and change it with a multitude of voices

and a fierce will of purpose……