day ONE THOUSAND and THIRTY FOUR

Lemmings

                After Russell Edson

On Monday, November 2, 2020 the unpresidential president stands on fifth avenue. A corpse at his feet. Smoking gun in his hand. A crowd congregates. Begins to cheer and clap.

The corpse sits up with an exasperated expression on its face and shouts, he shot me. You saw him do it, didn’t you?

The crowd heckles the corpse and begins to chant. BRING-IN-THE-BODY-BAG. BRING-IN-THE-BODY-BAG.

The corpse shrugs its shoulders, slumps over, and quietly waits for rigor mortis to set in.

The crowd roars. Marches to the closest polling station a day early and waits to cast their votes for the unpresidential president who will tell investigators that he simply fired the corpse. That the real culprit was the system. The rigged system . . .

--Corey Cook