Dixie cups lay reduced to red slime
mixed with the DNA of lips
who had drunk Kool-Aid while the world burned.
Silence speaks in steam and stench.
Bony charred hands still clutch their book of rules,
their quibble phones, and black pearls
identifying them as members of Fanatic Denial.
Barely able to walk, shaken by the reality
I am still breathing, my eyes search for life
in the gasps of smoke pulsating around me.
Through the gray I watch human forms
appear in a ghostly resurrection of life
I first assumed were hallucinations.
As they walk forward, I see one of them,
a young woman carrying a journal.
So many things storm my mind,
one being had I survived hell only to
be met with the foul text of failed ordinances.
Prepared to speak every no in me, I stop
as the group keeps to its goal of encroaching
on the toasted bit of earth I believe
will be my final battleground.
Without an introduction the young woman
opens the journal and begins to read.
“According to the Magpie Record, The Lucid Tablets
now becomes the order of law. Article 1 of
The Value of Truth requires every survivor
to go through gaslight deprogramming.”
Who, how, where rests on the tip of my tongue
as I pinch my right arm to verify I’m not dreaming.
Seeing my distress the young woman
places her hand on my wrist and says,
“I’m sorry to be so abrupt. We are standing on an ending
while a new beginning undulates beneath our feet.
Not knowing whether to cry or hug her, I break the ice
from my voice to say, “Miss, I don’t know who you are,
but I was on the Magpie Council when the Record,
and the Lucid Tablets were written.
In the time of the Great Lie the Secret Scribes
oversaw housing the Council’s work
for the Reformation of Freedom in a location
that was known only by them.
Because of security I never saw the journal
you are holding in your hands, but I know every word
that is written in it.
Let me introduce myself to you, “I am Magpie Agent 5.
©Susie Clevenger 2024
Wow! a science-fiction trip. Great writing, Susie.
ReplyDeleteWe are all in need of gaslight deprogramming at this point. (Wont it be a relief when it stops?) I LOVE the new beginning undulating beneath our feet! I love every line of this, especially the Magpie agents!! Fantastic, Susie!
ReplyDeleteVery much in the spirit of Philip K. Dick and his dystopian/utopian world, yet all your own--or should I say, our own--Susie. A complete narrative as story, yet also a true poem that shows and makes us see, not just recites a tale. I especially like the very real sense of horror in that first stanza, and it only gets better from there.
ReplyDeleteI love how you have honored PkD with your subject and feel, here. Magpie agent 5! I love that. I think that only utter destruction could wake the red-hatted sleepers at this point. I will say that right from the beginning I have held on to the adage that evil always contains the seeds of its own destruction. Now we are seeing Trump melt down and lose it in real time.
ReplyDeleteI love “quibble phones!” That’s it, exactly!
ReplyDelete