HOLLY DAY

A Language of Dissent

It has become imperative to create a new language
that our overlords won't understand, something beyond
teen slang or street jive, something not so much catchy pop culture,
but a lexicon suited for concise planning and destruction.
These words must be in newspapers, in leaflets nailed to telephone poles,
flashed at the bottom of television ads, incorporated into 1-800 numbers.

There is power in words, just ask the construction workers,
stumbling away from the Tower of Babel,
unable to finish their work because their language was taken away.
A total disconnect from the ruling class must be instigated,
and quickly, before they learn what we're doing,
before they grab our words and put them in their pop songs,
their car commercials, their runway fashion shows.
This all has to be kept separate.

Perhaps it begins with messages strapped to the legs of pigeons
flown from one rooftop to the next, palmed from one hand to another
in train stations and bus depots, untraceable notes
folded into the shapes of footballs and flung across a classroom,
an office, a courtroom. It can all start with one word,
something that translates to "freedom" or "murder" or both.

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