Cooler Heads

I have my confidence--
shuttering the blinds
stuttering in the street
when stopped
by the policeman--
that this is just
a period
of adjustment

Certainly,
in the end,
cooler heads will prevail.

In the mean
time,

I listen
to the radio
louder (sometimes)
to block the sounds
of sirens
and so called patriots
who invariably--
when arrested,
with that last gasp
of freedom--yell back
into the night
their name,
their occupation
their birthplace.

I turn the radio
up
again.  It is as if
someone believes
that someone knows
that something should be
written down
somewhere.

In the settled future,
there will be
an accounting:
the information scribbled
will be sacred text; these names
will be traced to prisons,
while the prisoners
are traced to graves.

The voice is clean
as a knife:
"The measures
we are taking,
unanimously approved
(the no-longer-deadlocked
committee
of safety) will eradicate
the dangers we believe
to be
everywhere."

There is claustrophobia
in the uncertainty
created by the changing
laws.  The accusations
of faceless, nameless
others are well-engineered
by revenge and spite.
And...

Even though
this is a government station--
triumphant and optimistic--
I know
it is provocative
to play it loud
enough to permeate 
the apartments filled
with neighbors
with radios
waiting behind
locked doors, silent
in familiar
desperation.

Anyway,
the radio will tell you
nothing.  The rumors
suggest a number
of deaths, confrontations
blood in the civic square.

The radio plays
the national anthem
at the top
of every hour.

Cooler heads...

Cooler heads
will (one day,
one hopes)
prevail.