Thursday, August 3, 2017

day ONE HUNDRED and NINETY SIX



Gateway to the Gulag

Putin said, No art in Perm,
            No to the decadence of the West.

No surprise. Art is always a snake to a dictator,
            sidewinding and fanged,

the artist who puts it there, equally
            unpredictable, seducing through melodies,

images that might turn minds away from
            the demagogue.

What Putin wants is what Kim Jong-un wants—
            what Trump wants,

billboards and marches, selfies and self-medicating,
           a rictus of smiling.

An artists’ colony at the gateway to the Gulag?
            Forget it.

--Devon Balwit

Bio: Devon Balwit is a writer/teacher from Portland, OR. Her political poems have appeared in The New Verse News, Poets Reading the News, Redbird Weekly Reads, Rise-Up Review, Rat's Ass Review, The Rising Phoenix Review, Mobius, What Rough Beast, and more.

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