there is a nascent impulse that
echoes in every heartbeat
living within our blood
to regard one another with the new eyes
science has built for each of us
to see the world independently
unaligned with ignorant ideology
untainted by nefarious nationality
but nurtured rather on the premise that reality
is the faculty of the mentally complete
who realize if we don't pause in our
crusade to exterminate each other we will
ultimately deplete what it is that makes us

sentient beings possessed with the will to
determine our own future
divorced from the vestiges of arbitrary
authority we might still muster the courage
to reject this putrid dichotomy that inundates
every aspect of our humanity with utter
lies and disjointed hypocrisies

we dare feign innocence when
blood saturates our hands
from the drones bombing
Yemen to the murdered children in Pakistan
our politicians are manufacturing new enemies
with every shot that rings out above
blood-soaked foreign lands
our taxes are their supply
endless war is their demand

it's written in our hallowed declaration
of independence which—of
late—seems groundless and impotent
that each of us are intrinsically
entitled to life and liberty
and the pursuit of happiness and that
it is not merely our right but our
obligation to abolish this
representative republic so destructive
to those ends

anarchy is our next great adventure

after all it seems glaringly clear to
me that there are few distinguishable
differences between the eighteenth century
monarchy and our present day corporate oligarchy
the interests of the people are mitigated to
pitched elections between two indistinguishable
political parties that infuse our world not with
democracy but with hegemony
they're content to watch the world rot

this is not the land of the free
it hasn't been since bison roamed
across midwestern plains and
Native Americans communed with
the Mother we all share
everything changed when white
puritans fleeing persecution
spread religion like a festering ulcer oozing
poison into the zeitgeist psyche
a hive-mind mentality that fosters
brainlessness and stifles free inquiry
gods gold and glory

we need to learn to disobey before
it's too late to erase the mistakes of
the apathetic elite who've apprehended
our liberty and co-opted our ingenuity
for projects feeding capitalist insanity

we must rekindle the insurrectionary spirit of
the creative, dedicated minority
who rose up in the 50's and 60's and
fought not with fists and guns
but with words and deeds
against war and poverty and
white supremacist patriarchy

nurture the embers and fan the flames
of the Black Lives Matter
organizers swarming the stages of
defunct politicians like Hillary Clinton
and Bernie Sanders who propagate
the status quo
pour gasoline on the fires raging
in the camps of Occupy
in Oakland and Wall St.
our modern day dissidents serve time in federal
penitentiaries for blowing the whistle
languishing in exile half-a-world away
they wear Guy Fawkes masks and hack
anonymously from the deep web
exposing state secrets and war crimes
sometimes they look a lot like you and
you'd best believe they look like me

no longer can we trust self-styled
leaders of the free world
if we labor to cultivate our
own communities that vaunt
authenticity above authority and
integrity instead of inanity
perhaps then we might recognize that
the impetus rests within the crux
of self-acceptance
and we all will say in unison
it starts with me