sting (a poem)

Tuesday, March 11, 2025

Message: STOP.
Reception only.
Backwards, toward a new dystopian future,
worse than we imagined.

Sci-fi and fantasy pale—
triggers buried in every supposed truth,
a simulation from our corralled pocket of game theory.
We are on a matrix, mapped and watching the Muppets,
never considering the strings on strings
pulling the next prime-time message into place.

Empire strikes back.
Hoth caves and an abominable—
we scavenge what bits of the Force we may,
to survive,
to fight another day.

Sting—
a dangerous foe, but still needing training.
To Dagobah, only what you take with you.

The fear claw creeps up our collective spine,
hatching a hive virus.
Colony collapse.

Episode: Relaunch.
New narrative, same design.

All new—
Vibes, cues—now you’ve got me
calculated, distilled, filed away,
an overheated neocortex burning out
on 150 lies you can manage.

And now you’ve got at least three trillion,
impervious, untouchable,
apparently.

Rogue One,
where are you?