“A cold coming, we had of it.”
So, Epiphany begins with the usual
obeisance to T.S. Eliot.
Out of Georgia came a star seen as hope,
a conjunction of new senators,
wise men from the South following Light.
But another herd “galled, sore-footed”
a wounded mob disenfranchised by lies,
false news read, not in the heavens.
Sprouted from the White House,
a demagogue grows a conspiracy
of weeds and brambles through the ears
of a cultic crowd of idolaters and believers
who know beyond reason how a stolen election,
sowed, stoked, ignite their fiery delusions for duty.
Darkness blazes in the despot’s mind lost in madness
with words to overthrow the temple dome
of democracy through insurrection and terror.
“Just the worst time of year” for anger
and chaos to breed rage signed with fury
by a dictator worshiped for his power.
His soldiers march with orders for combat
to invade and desecrate the halls of Congress,
to search and destroy the evidence of sacred honor.
A Republic like the child needs to be nursed
and nurtured with Freedom and Justice:
the gold, frankincense, and myrrh of Truth.
The magi, born from a dream known
by the prophets, Martin Luther King and John Lewis,
depart toward Washington by another way.
