Michele Stepto
Celebrate
with everything shut down
in a tight little box no
words for it for the rage
my fellow citizens
who used to be wise
turns out your wisdom
was a full belly
which tells no lies
or tells only lies
what did you do
what have we done
only laughter works
and we are choking on it
everyone has a joke
choking on the last laugh
if America is first
the Netherlands wants
you to know it wants
to be Number Two
it is good to laugh but
it hurts even more
afterward
and the lost words the words
no one wants anymore
jobs worker victim
patriot great decent
and the ones
we cannot find for the rage
for the horrors
here and to come
a whole lexicon
of civic being
beyond use
and only the big words
useful now like treason
tyrant and traitor
and the little
ones like hope
maybe and let’s
wait and see
celebrate
while you can
what you did what
we have done
Michele Stepto teaches writing and literature at Yale University and the Bread Loaf School of English. Her stories have appeared in Italian-Americana and various online journals. She is the translator, along with her son Gabriel, of Lieutenant Nun: Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New World.
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