Author’s note: Inspired by the absurd news story of a drunk raccoon.
Gramsci warned us in his Prison Notebooks:
“The old world is dying,
and the new world struggles to be born;
now is the time of monsters.”
Monsters cracking down on free speech,
threatening universities with funding cuts—
all under the guise of fighting antisemitism.
Monsters raiding homes in the name of security,
though the greatest threat to safety
is U.S. imperialism itself.
Bombing sovereign nations,
sanctioning free countries,
illegal pretexts dressed up
as the rule of international law.
Monsters fire double-tap drone strikes
at fabled cartels,
though most drugs cross the border
in citizens’ hands.
Will they strike inside their own country next?
You may say:
Obama did it.
Biden did it.
But repetition does not make it right.
Camus said,
“The absurd is born of this confrontation
between the human need
and the unreasonable silence of the world.”
Even the raccoons give up in silence—
drunk in liquor stores,
scavengers mocking the farce,
collapsing into self-destruction.
Absurdity testifies:
the monsters are everywhere.
Camus admitted he was hasty,
and eventually added:
“But what is absurd is the confrontation
of this irrational
and the wild longing for clarity
whose call echoes in the human heart.”
Clarity cries out—
the monsters deny it.
This is their indictment:
the empire is built on lies and silence.
—Tina Antonis
Sources:
Raccoon goes on drunken rampage in Virginia liquor store and passes out on bathroom floor
Fentanyl Is Smuggled for U.S. Citizens By U.S. Citizens, Not Asylum Seekers
Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci
The Myth of Sisyphus & Other Essays
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 