Graham Cowger -- The Arsonist -- NPR Tiny Desk Contest
Channel: gracow
Date: 2020-02-10

https://www.instagram.com/grahamcowger

The Arsonist

you fill the room
like cheap perfume
pouring gasoline you loosely hold the flame

drone on for hours
about yourself and all your powers
and every other that you blame

claim a righteous conscience
while spewing toxic nonsense
like a smokestack belching deadly poison gas

but you have your congregation and
you're selling them salvation
cashing checks from the ignorant mass

stoke the fire fan the flames
play the savior, quote the devil just the same
every stupid hateful word
provokes the know nothing herd

this slippery sleight of hand
meets the basest of demands
for empty slogans and misdirected hate

you're nothing without deceit
throwing bloody red meat
to feed the fear, confusion, anger you create

you think you're in control
but there's a bounty on your soul
pulling strings is someone else's job

usefully obtuse
you've got a pitchfork and a noose
this hollow outrage nonetheless incites the mob

a whitewash smile can't mask the fear,
fragile ego, vanity from ear to ear
the stink of greed lingers in the air
follows you everywhere

psychopathic, narcissistic,
racist fucking pig
you little child, spoiled rotten to the core

your bully pulpit shines
garish golden by design
the worst of every vice and little more

every accusation
an indictment of a nation
a hideous reflection of us all

you’re the grave that we have dug
a feature not a bug
of a system off a cliff about to fall