Minutes later the authorities rushed in,
shot him seven times and refused
appropriate medical treatment.

His death gave rise to the questions.
We've been here before,
you know what they are:
basically, what part of this story
even suggests he was wrong?

The police offer up their stories
and all stories are true, we've
been here before, you know
what they are: basically,
theses are uneasy times, and
the officers were merely on edge.

We've been here before, delving
into the tales from the land of paranoia
bounce around our thoughts, forever unresolved
grow larger each time, we return
to the latest installment of this story,
nothing new, only rewritten.

We've been here before,
you know the variations,
the tattered spans of attention,
the haggard suspensions of disbelief.

Jon Mathewson