Pantomime Panic

Pantomime Panic ©

By 

 Michael Casey

As you all know I love stories, I’ve followed stories all my life, going back to watching the tv with my dad over 50 years ago. I cannot believe as the final curtain is now perhaps a sniff away, that people still believe what they want to believe, and will deny the obvious. Reality is banished by Fantasy, and please don’t tell us the Truth, we are enjoying this self-delusion because we enjoy the transitory joys of money, in fact we love money. In fact let us build and worship a Golden Calf.

Pluto flashed by, melted ice dripping from  him, Einstein was a lap dancer drinking the ice dripping from Pluto, as Pluto sped past. Snow White was an alcoholic waitress drinking seven drinks at  a time. The Wicked Witch of the West was a spy for the East, clicking those red shoes together. The fat boy said he was really slim and people believed him, they were too busy watching the kneeling game. Sport was still king and people bet on it, as everything else was fake. Reality was Fake, and nobody trusted it.

Sport was supposed to knock down walls, and build pride in Team and Country, but there was more money to be made in building walls, so let’s  build them Higher and Higher, let’s touch the surface of the moon rather than talk to one another. His faith is not my faith, his colour is not my colour, his difference is not my mirror. Let’s just hate one another, let’s have an arms race of hate. 

Goebbels smiles approvingly from Hell, is you just repeat it often enough, people will be hypnotized by the Lie. Their own Love of Money, is the root to all their evil. Nobody will stand up to the new Emperor nobody will dare say he has no clothes. They have too much to lose, and the first thing they lose is their Pride, and when pride is lost a Fall surely follows.

Darkness falls across the Land, John is crying, though he spoke nobly from beyond his grave. The Keystone Cops are what the emperor requires, the cardboard cutouts he can blow over.  The Nation has fallen down a rabbit hole into a world only Alice would recognize. Off with his head, off with his head, is all that can be heard, the Emperor wants total control. Rules do not matter, a pig wearing lipstick is the new judge in the Emperor’s world.

When will the three little pigs stand united against the wolf as he huffs and puffs, and tries to blow the whole world down. Straw men stand in the way, each saying Not I Lord, as they dip their fingers in the trough, not I say the gatekeepers, not I say the jailers, not I say the brothel keepers, not I say the money changers, not I say the  sacrifice sellers in the courtyard to the big house. We’ll take a lie detector test, they all suck up to the Emperor.

The three little pigs move to the house made of sticks as the Emperor smashes the straw house away. And again everybody prostitutes themselves so they can  stay by the Emperor’s side. Outside the fat boy polishes the Emperor’s new car, maybe he’ll be allowed to drive it too. If the fat boy smiles enough, and lies enough the Emperor will be flattered enough and not notice the bomb hidden in plain sight, but the Emperor is always right, the fat boy is a good boy now, see look at the selfies the Emperor took.

The Press protests but the Emperor says they are all liars, and why does he always repeat words 3 times? Because the Emperor is brain washing his adoring public, Goebbels smiles from heaven, he must be in heaven with the angels now, so perfect is the propaganda. And on go the lies, more and more lies, photo-shopped from the day of the inauguration. Soon the house of sticks is blown away, this is perfect house of cards creation.

The wizard of oz puts in an appearance, the little dog laughs to see such fun and the dish runs away with the spoon. But the Emperor denies it all, and closes down all the newspapers that speak the truth, they are all liars anyway, and he repeats it thrice. Pinocchio his PR spokesperson issues denials after denials, as his nose gets so big  the press room has to be extended to fit his lies and his nose.

Finally the three little pigs realize only a brick build nuclear fallout shelter will be strong enough to protect them from the emperor. As they retreat from all the lies, damn lies, and statistics only then does everybody else realize that this vision of hell. Dante’s Inferno has been replaced by the Emperor’s vision, or rather delusion upon delusion, as the band plays on as the Titanic hits the rocks. Will they all drown, cursing themselves, for believing in this false god, this false emperor? 

This has just been a passing nightmare, a horror show of a pantomime, the emperor will say Judas, we are all Judases. But in the real world we can all wake up and make a new choice, raise our voice, all our voices to heaven. We can start to love one another again, we can heal all the emperor’s splits and hatred. For a nation divided will fall just as the Roman Empire fell, so in November go out and vote for Love thy neighbor, and banish the Emperor into the darkness from whence he came, before the Light of Liberty is quenched in the sea of selfish selfies.