A Tidal Wave Poem
in my dream, the strongman threw my pagesof poems into a wastebasket and told me
not to write another poem about democracy.
so I wrote a tidal wave poem instead.
no more poems about human rights
and fundamental freedoms, free and fair
elections, independent branches
of government, freedom of expression and press,
constitutional guarantees of civilian authority.
no more poems about democratic principles
that fashioned my poems, they, that turned chaos
and madness into people power, would no longer
have permission to enter my poems. instead, I wrote
a tidal wave poem that wasn’t a democracy poem
or a democratic principles poem. no, this was
a tidal wave poem about a tidal wave coming.
not an about-democracy or about-democratic-principles
type of poem, not a poem about diversity and inclusion,
one man-one vote, international law, or equal justice
under the law. no, this poem was about a tidal wave.
a tidal wave so strong and so powerful, so potent
and so heavy, it could destroy everything evil
in its path. a tidal wave thousands of miles long
propelled by the benevolent strength of the sun,
the moon and the earth. a tidal wave so demanding
so dominant that his eyes and his lungs
looked drowned. a tidal wave that yelled
don't ever fuck with my country again.
a tidal wave so powerful, so so heavy
and strong, that, yes, it deserves its own poem.