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AS IF CATULLUS COULD RESPOND TO PRESIDENT TRUMP - NEW POEM BY ERIC SIGLER, AMERICAN POET AND SATIRIST

Inaugural Occasional Poem: The White House
Casting Couch Is Visited By Zeus as Golden Rain
BY THE AMERICAN POET AND SATIRIST ERIC SIGLER

 

I

 
I thought I saw a smoke screen or a cloud
descend through spears that rallied at the sky,
and railed against the theme -
four years beneath a shroud-
until I woke to see that, in my eye,
I could not emancipate the dream 
from shackles chained to starlight -
a strident stalker wading through the night,
an endless specter searching for a theme....

 

II

 
But then I saw sun's gilded feet retreat - 
high-heeled hopes broken by the darkness,
love that lies alone on mirrored splinters,
shattered by the monuments of defeat,
that thrust into the eyes the vile success 
of tyrants who elect to be successors -
their statutory statutes on the plaques -
marble mountains moved on others' backs -
destroyers in the mantles of the victors....

 

III

 
He heard his daughter's son would bring him death,
though prophecies are dead - the prophets mute -
the grander grandeur - puppet on a pulpit-
the bloviating toxins on his breath
the wind that withers trees and dries the roots,
that topples the foundations of the spirit,
the ignorance that feeds on fear and doubt,
that puts the fire of liberty ever out,
and leaves us desolate and destitute.... 

 

IV

 
This caused the Don to build a golden cage,
and lock his daughter there until forever. 
The father of no country - of no child -
the bearer of the void - this lightless age -
who hides his terror in his gilded tower - 
to torture and torment those he defiled
by lies that fed the truth of their desire
to hold their leader highest of the higher,
the feral alpha calling to the wild.

 

V

 
The daughter lay sequestered in the tower,
imprisoned in a dungeon with no window.
The tyrant feared the oracles of karma, 
and as he held the absolutes of power, 
he knew that his today would come tomorrow -
that death would be a sorry melodrama -
his name would ever desecrate the dust
that drowns the articles of blinded trust - 
the tides of time that brought us this enigma...

 

VI

 
He struts in his new clothes before the mirror
that slims him in the image of himself -
his hair the color of the coming sun.
He wears it like the falsified demeanor 
of pimps who preen to flash their worthless wealth,
who act as if the answer and the one.
So self-absorbed, delirious with power,
he seeks to steal the mother from the father,
or be the father of his daughter's son....

 

VII

 
He could not drown - leaden in the water -
nor touch a drink to demonize his soul.
He feels his bloated beauty does not change -
but stoops to snort an energizing powder,  
his fingernail dipped in a crystal bowl,
a morbid mind the dopamine deranges,
that stimulates the power of abuse,
so that he thinks himself the mighty Zeus,
that he will come disguised as Golden Rain.

 

VIII

 
He paints the tainted sunlight on his face,
plucks his brows and bellows like a bull.
He looks again into his lying mirror,
but can not see the truth of his disgrace -
that he must grope to find a fingerful,
that he can't stand erect without a popper,
however beauty sizzles in his child -
the image of himself that he defiled
and locked inside a dungeon in his tower.

 

IX

 
He looks outside his window at the clouds,
bends upon his knees and bows his head.
The sanctuary of his inner demons 
is draped in curtains made of funeral shrouds.
The promises he pilfered for the dead
he offered in the rantings of his sermons,
the lies that told the truth of his deceit,
the deadly hatred of the feigned elite,
who look upon their lessers as their vermin.

 

X

 
Now our tears have shed the Golden Rain,
and he has liquified into the chamber 
where he can rape and pillage and destroy - 
and like a madman - utterly insane -
he showers his gifts upon his sleeping daughter, 
and leaves his seed to scatter and deploy
the legions of the army of amorals,
the vengeance of the gross deplorables,
who never knew the simple joy of joy.

 

XI

 
And as this would befit a grand occasion,
I offer this entertainment to the Ball,
and join the singers singing their bright songs,
knowing that we face pure disillusion,
that what we saw before was not at all  
the truth that has amassed in these dark throngs,
the hatred now that's branded on the sleeves,
the golden calf in which the crowd believes - 
here neither love nor joy nor hope belongs....

 
January 20, 2017
Miami

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