What darkness now descends on a world
Consumed with fear and noxious loathing?
What darkness now consumes the imagination,
Selfishly hoards, kills with noiseless derision?

Invisible foes march in lockstep with fools
Who miss the message and suffuse with noise,
While faceless masses lead the way out of the abyss,
Accompanied by leaders who express but a simpering hiss.

What darkness now descends upon beleaguered souls
Sequestered in their shuttered quarters, afraid, alone,
Coping with bodies shattered, minds in fogged delirium?
And this met with monarchic ravings of imperium!

Disinformation, the nausea of lies and propaganda,
Josef Goebbels’ demented smile painted in clouded skies
Above the offices housing seats of power whose occupants
With contempt discredit reason, brandish armaments.

To what end, this bluster of gormless charlatans
Polluting airwaves with hollow cries of “reboot?”
Tears pour from skies replete with ominous clouds,
Panic leaches barricaded soil, wasted lives, exposed bowels.

This is not the new normal.
This is a prolonged abnormal,
Suspension of reality amidst fallen bodies
Stuffed in unrefrigerated containers by the dotty.

We cannot mask the stench, no, not of bodies,
We cannot mask the fetid aroma of forsaken reason,
Nor can we stop the retching of the weary
Who listen and know well this bombast of the season.

This stasis of spirit, this lingering mold of minds
Of those who think they know better,
They better know—the time will come,
They will have to answer, not stay dumb.

—Robert Hieger
    May 12, 2020