Losing Peru

Damn it.
I simply cannot leave Peru alone
for a single minute.
My mind wanders while armies mass in Brazil.
What demon’s spawn haunts this child?
Takes possession of the pure and wide-eyed
innocence of youth?
He’s already filled the borders
of Argentina beyond carrying capacity,
overloaded, overcrowded
with edgy militants.
I guessed (mistakenly, it would seem)
that he’d give chase
as I led my people out of tyranny,
crossing the isthmus of Central America
on our way to freedom
in the United States.
But now, left back
in Peru to mind the store,
my friends stare down the barrels
of countless cannons.
And I can only look back
from my disastrous foray in the North,
and watch while the circling dogs close in,
growling, chewing up Peru,
and South America falls
to fascist rule.

Oh Jesus.
Now Ontario’s on the move
and Iceland’s ass is hanging out.

James D.Autio