Sometimes I Shazam random songs.
I don't even have to like'em or anything..
I just do it.
Press the big blue button and wait for it to do its job.
I'm always sad when it says it's sorry and returns no result.
"They didn't quite catch that. Try again". Who does?

Sometimes I Shazam random noises on the metro,
Hoping it will pick up the coolest soundtrack of a movie I'm in,
Just before the credits,
When everything goes dark - but not because of a random suicide bomber that hates life and wants revenge or something.
It returns no results and the TV suddenly goes louder in my head and there are 23 victims and we're all posting kittens on Facebook to show that we're not afraid.

Sometimes I Shazam my parents voices
while they're telling me how their day went
and I discover really cool indie artists
that make me listen to their work in a loop.

Once, I Shazamed your heartbeat while you were sleeping.
It returned my name.
Can't remember the album, but it had a nice cover photo.

I never Shazamed my own voice, nor my heartbeat.
I'm too afraid it'll show nothing worth listening to.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A107BwLLGbE]

Looking at
her photos
on the internet
captioned as
"Finally an explorer"
I also became
An Internet Explorer.

©Rpan

first,
lemme just
check my facebook
to see if
anybody else has
"high functioning anxiety"
like me

i'm so sorry
your goldfish died
that's a nice picture
of your stupid wife

time to delete
another racist
let's face it -
you probably live
in your mom's basement

i just like the dog memes

wake up at six 6am.
grab my phone.
check my feed.

you are always
there.
first post.
always wearing
your beautiful
smile.

maybe the algorithm
realized how
i stare at our photos,
some nights
before sleeping.

maybe he
makes the sum
of our unsaid words
and multiplies it
by those nights
i fell asleep in
your chest.

maybe he
never heard
our fights.
the shouting,
the crying.
or maybe he did
but just choose
to keep them
out of the equation.

maybe he
knows
you are still
the first person
i think of
when i wake.

i scratch my eyes
and keep scrolling.

He says "Geek Poet!
Leave the politics alone
Stick to Pop culture"

Cousin.
Politics ARE Pop culture.
don't you see?

in a world where businesses
buy natural disaster insurance
In fear of presidential tweets
McDonald's burger vending machines
You think this isn't dystopia?

We play games to escape.
where can we go
when the "real world"
is just as scary
upside down?

Tell me, Cousin.
Where do you write your poetry?
is it safe?

Do you surround yourself with muses?
back turned to a naked woman?
is there whiskey on the bar,
A journal,
your favorite pen?
Your cell phone,
clentching in the public restroom?

because no matter where you are.
that sanctuary
is a ******* pillow fort
compared to the Fort Knox
of an artists imagination

politics ARE pop culture
China is throwing unfathomable
amounts of money into Propaganda
targeting millennials though memes.
Fish don't see water, remember?

You are telling me
I can't write about politics.
There are Americans
who have never voted,
Radical left and right facebook profiles
protecting and attacking A Racist,
selfish, blemish on our history.
you wonder why we are scared, Cousin?

You want to know why I am so loud?

I watch Men step alligator shoe
out of Boston limousines
Slicked back hair straight
from wolf of wallstreet
belligerent screaming
"I do what I Waaaaaaant!"
"She does what she waaaaaaaaaaaaants!"
"We do what we waaaaant!"

This is the world
we're escaping from.
Excuse me if I break
from the zombie jokes
The vampire romances
Focus on the dead bodies
in our own city, Cousin.

Our demons are real now.

dystopian literature
called for the 2017 election
as far back as the 1930s'

Senator Buzz Windrip
from "It can't happen here"
by Sinclair Lewis
makes promises
to "return America to a better time".
back in 1935

buying validity for his ideas
in airtime on the radio,
tarring those who disagree,
as tools of mother russia,

dismissing woman,
as silly socialists.
naming the press
"a lot of irresponsible wind bags."

In the book "Parable of the talents",
Octavia butler Predicts a "Pox" In 2015
Wiping most of the population.
President Andrew Steele Jarret
promising to return the country
to an "Older Simpler time".
She wrote this book in 1998

Want to learn how to defeat Trump?
Read "Our Twisted Hero,"
by Yi Munyol

Read "In the Heart of the Valley of Love, "
by Cynthia Kadohata

All of these Dystopian fantasies
Prepare the Geeks
to rise up and fight.
Pop culture is the only thing saving us
Knowledge is the only thing saving us
Standing up,
Making art,
Being loud
is the only thing saving us
from the red button
in the orange hands
of the man who NEVER Had
the best words,

Because we do.

Repeat After me:

We The Artists
The Geeks who shall inherit
Swear to protect our words.
We will not bow,
bend,
or break.
Ink is the blood of prophets
The voice is a weapon

Excuse me if I fight
For education over distractraction.
Forgive me for preaching
Art as our gospel.

you can't Incite Revolution
by throwing dice at ghosts.

I am sick of being tall
because my friends
are too busy crawling
I'm putting all my stat points into
inspire

Let me incite placebo healing
for a small fraction
of the tortured
anxiety pretzels I walk along
each day.

I will spit
on anxiety paper-cuts
from this paperback of bigotry
in our future history
labeling myself neosporin prayin'
God,
PLEASE
let me be charismatic enough.