dialectic tear gas

by Roberto Lavidez  

tapping 

the collective

consciousness

the intellectual

catches a glimpse

of the groundlessness

of our beliefs

and practices

determinable faiths

of various messiahnisms

are caught in the web

of contradicting stories

most dangerous

is religion

when it conceives itself

as a higher knowledge

announcing 

to the natives

far and wide

that civilization

was dawning

snatching moments

of conversation

in a disruptive 

intrusion

on the 

unsettled present

firing tear gas

and rubber bullets

at protesters

whose agony was

so great that their

tongues hang out

thoroughly

disenchanted

disappointed

and disheartened

marching and

collapsing in 

the soaked grass

surrounded

by wild violets 

and the

carnivalesque 

singing

of skylark

yearning 

to avoid

repeating

past mistakes

history affords few

happy endings

in a parody of ritual

an ominous warning

about where 

dreams of empire 

can lead

has strained

and loosened 

the connecting links

by which hope

is passed

continual combat 

is always part

of exploring faces

from which one

turns with an

involuntary shudder 

of repulsion

immobilized

lacking freedom

and movement

inhospitable to the

coming of the other

intelligible paradigm

from the labyrinth

of cognition

just another bit

of injustice

in unjust  

little vacuous

self-defeating world

unromantic

toward

the dialectic

machine

©robertolavidez2013