And even madmen manage to convey
Unwelcome truths in lonely gibberish.
          —Auden¹

                    i.

Might be remiss but unashamed
to say this, to lay it on them
thickest without remorse, yes, an
asshole unafraid to break some
records and the toilet of the
world with my words every time

I take a shit, unwilling to
put up with theirs anymore, hard-
core ignore them any chance I
get yet just cannot be ignored
myself, no matter how badly
I crave anonymity, want

to shut down the goddamned fiction
of the “we” they cultivate in
their simplest heads, pretending at
illusions of community
as if there exists any chance
in hell of any “us” ever

                    ii.

connecting, firebrand/malcontent
always intent on dismantling
such ill-informed expectations,
eager to alienate those
hordes of new followers who pour
in, those drones desperate for my

acknowledgment, automatons
I blow up with just one click, one
picture my wit’s vitriol paints
painfully accurately, sprays
invectives, flaming text which tags
them in polemics, jokes of which

they are always the punchline, but
never quick enough to be in
on it, those unschooled fools drooling
over ridicule they inform
and warrant, this is porn for me,
the same way Kim Kardashian’s

                    iii.

ass broke the Internet, way-back-
when, do you remember it? To
Millennials (or are they X,
Y, Z? obsolete yet? since there
are now no letters left in the
alphabet to designate

them: entire generations of
superfluous idiots, pests
over-populating this dead
planet…) every incident’s
unfolding more than a moment
ago is ancient to them, dust

of monuments progress reduced
to memes & GIFs, digital trinkets
ignorant of true permanence,
the unthinking ephemeral
is a kiss brutalizing stone,
what my lips prophesy against.

__________
¹W. H. Auden, “The Useful” in “[Poem] 60. The Quest”, [Stanza 3, Lines 13–14], of Selected Poems: Expanded Edition: Edited by Edward Mendelson, published at New York by Vintage International in 2007; page 115.