04 February 2024

#4 - burn all the liars

Number five of George Carlin’s ‘Seven Dirty Words’

Borrowing (with all apologies) from ‘Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge on Seattle’ by Kurt Cobain

Allegedly the response Frances Farmer gave when asked her profession by the police...


One day, they say, you will come back as fire

that sweeps in vengeance down through Puget Sound

to raze diseased Seattle to the ground

one day, they say, you will become desire.

One day, they say, you will burn all the liars

whose fictions twist the wide-eyed world around

in halls of ash where hypocrites are crowned

one day, they say, you will escape the pyre.


Proscenium arch and movie camera frame

a woman chained, an antiseptic bed,

a fading tableau of vicarious shame,

a kind of triumph for the honest dead,

as cops and robbers play their endless games

we still remember every word you said...


RJT




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