Beyond Borders

image from impactlab.net 

Beyond Borders

“A modern democracy is a tyranny whose

borders are undefined.”--Norman Mailer.

Walk anywhere in a straight line

until someone or something stops you,

reminding you that no one lives in a space

devoid of parameters.

As you ponder your limits, consider

the complexity of your cage;

        barrier or decor,

           emotional limits versus

                nether regions of redefined morality, like

           red ruffles on an apron,

        wood/plastic/metal edges

     pounded onto Art, or esoteric

stapled-on foreskins & scalps,

or that which constitutes a frame,

or the digital capture of pieces of

the horizon, or those twenty foot rusting girders that

                         stand at rigid attention, part of an

                      unfinished fence erected along

                 our Southern border, or armed

           guards holding sub-machine guns,

       or tall steel parallel fences that

have swirls of razor-sharp barbed

wire strung out like deadly dandelions

for the indifferent wind to blow through,

                                     to draw blood.

                                     to deter,

                                     to confine,

                                     to keep out

undesirables, trespassers, and all those

who might want to do us harm--

or even the unbalanced unhinged state of our

commander-in-chief that borders on madness,

ignorance and xenophobia--or the thin blue line

between us and criminals--or the ton of chrome

trim we used to decorate our vehicles with-or the

fragile membranes between good health and a

heart attack--those polished nails at the end of 

our digits--or the 21 overlapping dimensions 

that are reputed to exist within the space we think

we inhabit--or the humungous hedge we grow 

around our property to create privacy, and to

insulate us from the steady chaotic stream of

flesh & machines that parade past; specifically

the margin, edge, perimeter, frontier, boundary,

circumference, girth, height, weight, periphery,

rim and fringe of

everything.

We exist within our

borders, but do not need to

be defined by them.

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub