The Man in High Tower
Where empires once guarded their gates, new towers rise, whispering the same lies. (San Paolo, Rome, Italy)
Once upon a time,
There was a man in high tower,
Looking into the tinted mirror—
Flipping his silky hair,
He whispered to himself—
More, more, more.
Mine, mine, mine.
The man in the tower,
Looked across
The expansive horizon.
With hands on his hips,
He whispered into the air,
More, more, more.
Mine, mine, mine.
So he called the people,
Into the square.
He proclaimed,
In a loud vigorous voice,
‘There are dragons out there,
Gigantic beastly monsters,
Beady golden eyes,
With split slithering snake tongues!’
‘What dragons are there?
I thought they aren’t real.
No longer with us,
Slain—
Lying dead—
Beneath us.’
‘No, no, what a foolish man!’
Stomped the man in the high tower.
‘I’ve seen them
From my tall tower.’
‘There are dragons out there,
Gigantic beastly monsters,
Beady golden eyes,
With split slithering snake tongues!’
The towns people alarmed—
Didn’t know what to think.
With a gasp they shriek,
‘What will we do?
Who will save us?’
A studied scholar steps forward,
‘Enough with your lies,
The only slithering snake tongue,
Is you with gleaming eyes!’
With a pointy sharp finger,
‘This studied scholar
Is a great deceiver!
You see her
With her large magical books,
Why, she is a witch—
The minion—
Of these mighty snake dragons!
Look at her hairy lip,
Her gigantic mole,
Her wide set jaw,
And her big lofty hands!
Why she is no woman at all!
A witch—
A vicious child-eater!
Men—
Get it!’
So the guards leapt
On the scholar
As the villagers stood by,
Whispering—
‘I see now,
There are dragons out there,
Gigantic beastly monsters,
Beady golden eyes,
With split slithering snake tongues!’
‘Who will save us?’
The villagers start to cry.
‘Why a king of course,
They always appear—
Right when you need them
to slay beastly winged dragons!’
‘These foolish people,’
Thinks the man of high tower
Smiling—
Greedy as a blood-fed child.
‘They do all the thinking,
I barely need to feed them.
For dragons are both myth
And real—
You only need to know,
How to command them.
For I—
Of course,
Will save them
and be crowned—
High King.’
So the warriors suited up,
The men with pitchforks gathered.
With metal scales,
And flaming torches,
Gallantly, they rode off
To slay mythical dragons.
They rode off to far off lands,
Setting fire to villages.
Burning anything foreign,
Melting down ‘idols’—
Slaying vicious ‘dragons’.
Not our problem,
Snub the shimmering ones,
Bathing their flaxen hair,
In bright summer forest waters.
Until the streams dried up
From the dragon’s long drink,
And the forests were no more.
Not our problem,
Chime the ones
with long silvery whiskers.
For back in my day,
Our comforts were
Much less—
And I turned out,
Just fine.
Chuckling—
It’ll all be ok!
And the man in the tower,
Hand perched on his brow,
Squinting across the smoky horizon,
He whispered through the haze,
More, more, more.
Mine, mine, mine.
So with his jagged pointy sharp finger,
Stretched out to the queer—
The ones who would not breed mares.
‘Look at these creatures,
Ever so strange!
How unnatural,
Disgusting—
Why they must be—
Vile.
What they’re doing,
In wash rooms,
In secret—
Revolting.
Why—
We must protect
The women—
The children,
Born—
And unborn!’
So along with the witches,
The studied scholars,
They rounded up
All those deemed
Strangely queer.
And the man in the tower,
A tunneling telescope to his eye,
Peered across the blazing horizon,
He whispered into the flames,
More, more, more.
Mine, mine, mine.
So with his honed,
Jagged pointy sharp pointing finger,
Stretched out to the gold miners,
The thick eye-browed,
Staunchy small fellows—
Those with big tunneling noses.
‘These gold miners,
Gold jewelers,
With their hefty tally books,
Paled skin—
Inside deep dark mountains.
They are the workers,
Of these demonic dangerous dragons.
Look how they hoard,
Look how their eyes gleam.
How selfish they snicker,
At the layer—
Caked upon your sun-cracked skin.
So along with the witches,
The studied scholars,
And the queers.
They rounded up all those
With pointy tunnel noses.
And so that’s how
The man in high tower
Got to be king.
Wait, you cry!
That cannot be the whole thing!
Where is the true king,
Riding up on his majestic steed?
The one who speaks truth to power—
Saves the princess—
And slays the dragon in high tower?
Ah, maybe among you,
Is such a person,
Maybe we’ll see.
But we won’t know—
Until such a person speaks.
But why would you
Listen to this person?
When to the women,
You cried—
Foul witch.
Or to the lovers,
You spat—
Too queer?
Or to the mountain keepers,
With cave dust in their hair?
But now the dragon
Comes for us—
Our women
And children
And our share!
And see now,
This is the lesson—
Dragons are myths
And yet now very real.
Were we not better
With them laying dormant—
Forgotten?
Our sharing was communion,
Our abundance was much.
No true king is coming.
No savior on a steed,
Only us—
Deceived, misled,
Grieving our lost ones—
The ones we held dear.
So together—
Let us ride up to the tower,
Slay this slithering dragon!
With this—
We’ll save our beloved—
Our love—
Our great nation!
(Every fairy tale has its Farquaad in tall towers. And sometimes the Ogre in the mud, only wanting their swamp— is closer to the truth. )