The revolution will not
be televised—chronicled
instead in college notebooks,
composition, spiral, leather
bound. Give me your eager,
your broken words
yearning to scale free—breathe
an ellipsis, break a dash,
lie down in a grave
of your own first drafts,
climb on top of cars
to cry for cease,
for fire, for the UN
to haul the click-clack of
red pens away, wash yourself
in a bath of ink, lay your body
on an A4 paper and spread
snow-angels, peel words
out of your skin, slough yourself
into the irregular lines of your mind
music, drink the wine
of your subconscious and sleep with
its multiverse, its nonsense, its huddled life: listen
to Walt Whitman tell you all the world’s
a poetry slam; he’s chanting through
a megaphone on the rooftop,
an audience of letters is breaking the fourth wall,
streaming through the theater, thrown
at the actor’s feet howling
for a chance to shine, to skip, to halt,
to stream like light until the end of the line.
Dream songs, inscape, break out
of Amherst in your white dress
sprout wings from your scapula
cry for revolution—
put down your spades, your keyboards,
your codes and locks, leave your cubicles,
your lawnmowers and yoga mats,
park your trucks
on the side of the road because
the time has come—hand in hand—my friends,
the tyranny loosens and in each
child’s hand a notebook is open
to the first blank page
and the sky sings hope—
the epic of tomorrow is written,
word by word,
in your hand today.