I know they’ve been around for tens of centuries –
three abstract nouns
named Justice, Patriotism, Freedom,
I used to revere
until I had the chance to confront them
with my fear:
they were but mastodons of civic life.

I met them one spring, at a May Day parade,
wearing blue and throwing cherry blossoms
from carriages;
I remember the air being as fresh and clear
as my tender years.

For a while
they vanished from the public eye;
still you could find them in textbooks,
presidential decrees, speeches,
holding red carnets of party membership,
the same abstract nouns
named Justice, Patriotism, Freedom,
hailed and praised as the only possible legacy,
yet used and abused,
literally exhausted in their mission,
every day more haunted
by the very ghost of their inner being,
now shabby and paranoid,
hiding behind uniformed cordons
of yes men.

It was December
late, almost winter
when they erupted from closets and dusty shelves
into the night,
three abstract nouns
named Justice, Patriotism, Freedom,
and I knew they were out somewhere
because that night
there were shots and smoke in the air,
and the following nights,
there were shots and smoke everywhere
in the streets,
the blood steaming warm
in the University square
seemed a red sea of carnets
of old party members
in madly despair.

They possibly died that night,
or just abandoned a worn out costume
to assume a new look;
shaved or grew beards, I wouldn’t know for sure,
but in the next several months
the most shameless came first
with this lusty disgusting thirst
for all three abstract nouns
named Justice, Patriotism, Freedom,
hasting to relabel shelves
in the history warehouse,
present and past.
At last,
to my surprise
they even tried to franchise
some sort of emergency kit of tin badges
names with three abstract nouns
Justice, Patriotism, Freedom,
so you could not tell anymore
white from black,
and at that point I knew that all values
had a shipwreck;
then I swore
to stay always with my lore,
and never again trust the smoke in the air.
No more.



©Elena Malec, California, January, 1997