By R.H. Nicholson
Honestly,
I thought fires would flair and
debris would tumbleweed in the streets,
that the power would intermittently surge and
cell phone service would be spotty at best
when it all fantastically
collapsed.
I assumed store shelves would be perpetually empty
of toilet paper and eggs,
bread and milk,
Twizzlers and Cheetos,
booze and cigarettes,
that we would all eat tuna
straight from the can.
I imagined toxic fumes obliterating our view
of the sun,
that murderous gangs would roam our neighborhoods
raping and pillaging,
that all the colors would fade— brown grass, gray skies, rusty water,
that the world would smell like a congested sewer,
rats nipping at our feet,
smoke all around, our eyes scratchy with irritation.
America sweaty and sinister,
dark and desperate.
Instead,
we go about our days,
zig-zagging in and out of traffic,
dropping the kids at school,
picking up prescriptions, scrolling on our phones,
cheering for our favorite teams, streaming movies,
knocking back a few beers with friends,
while the infrastructure disintegrates,
our elected officials either tools or
powerless, or both,
free and unbiased media replaced by Newspeak,
masked troops trolling our cities, tazing, clubbing, shooting us at will,
disappearing folks,
our neighbors hiding like Anne Frank because they are
brown or trans or have an accent or are somehow “undesirable”.
We accept mass shootings because,
eh, that’s life.
We tolerate corruption,
division, sectarianism,
the stench of ruination goes
undetected.
We are unconcerned about
international crises, the environment, proxy wars, human trafficking and such
as long as we still have Taco Bell and video games,
big ass pick-up trucks and casual hook-ups.
We don’t really mind,
we seem not to care,
we take no action,
we shrug our shoulders
as it all
quickly
falls
into ruin.