The Despot
       

The severed hand of the despot
Is at first considered an anomaly drawing
Tourists to the new country
Now controlled by the people
Formerly oppressed by the hand.

No one knows what happened
To the body but everyone is grateful
Most of the despot is gone.

Sometimes the hand pinches
Young girls in elevators or in market
Stalls and there is no one to slap—
The hand moves as a hummingbird
Which was the Aztec god of war.

The people formerly oppressed
Have very little money because their land
Was owned by foreign powers
That held the despot in place
As securely as a nail might hold
A prophet to a beam.

The people raised funds for schools
And hospitals that vanished under
The despot by selling tickets to tourists
Who paid to see the severed hand
Rattling the bars of its cage or scratching
A phantom itch or swatting
A non-existent fly.

In an otherwise empty room
At a rickety card table watched
Through one-way glass by the brothers
And sisters of the new government
The severed hand of the despot taps the ash
From a cigarette on the floor—

Drums the table with its thumb
Before picking up the pen to sign
The documents of surrender.

Only then did we hear the sound
Of his other hand clapping.

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Copyright © 2021 Gary Lemons All rights reserved
from Snake IV: Original Grace
Red Hen Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission