exceptional isms in poetry

rise? Rome didn’t fall in a day either
fall? it fell instead as road by road
fell bridge by bridge and town by town
some places didn’t know for generations that it ended
that the store was no longer being tended
Istanbul was Constantinople but no longer is
that’s what it’s like this slow apocalypse

the very finest of the seers know no magic
they cast no withers, they augur no guts
they roll no bones, they simply note the
cycles of history and when they see an
unlearned-from mistake repeated say
“it will happen again”
“it is happening now”
Rome falls as we speak
and idealistic denial
only speeds the plow

there are things your failures can teach you
that a thousand years of success never could
but that is one our great bald ape flaws
we only listen to success stories
we refuse to see the parallels
we only see the glory coming
not the horrors before us
we could prevent by instead
focusing on helping each other
instead of trying to be big
goddamned heroes
as it falls
as it once rose

everyone believes they are the exception
their family is the exception
their social group is their exception
their generation is the exception
one of the maddening things about
how short a human life lasts is that
we so often ignore how we are
adrift in cycles beyond us
something like this all
happened before and
someday in the future
it’ll all happen more
or less
maybe less if we stand
back and examine our
excess and our obsession
with immediate success

so here we are
a nation in shambles
a nation in need
a nation requiring “harm reduction”
as its final holy creed
long past the time for messianic grandstanding
time for the desperate work of putting out a
million fires or maybe being
to busy aggrandizing ourselves
as heroes to put them out at all
that’s how Rome did rise
that’s how Rome did fall

Last updated April 20, 2020