Casus Belli

“Confrontation” by Werner Drewes

(Regarding the Charlottesville protest violence)

 

which is the twitch

to trigger oblivion

knobs of maniacal

red yellow green

black and white

flashing lights

insane signals

to throw them all

throttle arms

balls-to-the-wall

all the bonfire words

of automatons

burnt to hot cinders

in mouths of

a motorized terror

extreme right and left

pistoned impulses

hard driven hatreds

smash out against

symbols repugnant

intolerance mutual

placards and flags

hoisted high

on hysteria

fascist machines

confront

fascist behaviors

alike yet opposed

in pitched battle

for putative

high ground

across the deep

social divide

mighty engines

excited with power

from factions whose

steampunk moralities

scream in the cogs

of an overhot animus

gears gnash and tear

in a terrible grinding of

clockwork catastrophe

violent implosions

send disarranged

metals and minds

cutting swaths

through the firmament

maiming the flesh

of philosophy

killing the discourse

annealed by opinion

a bloodletting

garish and crude

apparatus of intellect

shattered and scattered

among the mechanical

corpses who litter

an ungodly ground

and the rest of us

here in the smelted

political middle

deserving of wounds

count as casualties