In March of this year, while the Republican Primary was still ongoing, Mitt Romney gave a speech condemning Donald Trump and pleading with his party’s voters to select essentially anyone else as their nominee. At the time, I was struck by how apocalyptic the speech’s subtext seemed, so, using Politico’s transcript of his remarks as a guide,  I constructed a shitty free verse poem, using only Romney’s own words (with heavy deletions), original context be damned. I am posting this poem now, because with Trump being accused of sexual misconduct and the Republican Party in virtual chaos, it seems like Mitt’s apocalypse may have arrived. Please do not take this piece as a statement of support for or of opposition to any candidate, but rather as an act of voyeurism, the moment of rubbernecking that this disaster demands.

an oppressive government
darker, less free

poverty persists
wages are stagnant

horrific massacres
nuclear ambitions

we live in troubled and dangerous times
the bright horizon … will not materialize

But you say, wait, wait, wait …
Isn’t he … ? Doesn’t he … ?
No, he isn’t and no he doesn’t.

crushed … the men and women

I know that some people want this race to be over.
the rules … have pretty much all been shredded

the safety of our homes and loved ones
and then we can pick up the remnants
Now, think about that.

This recklessness is recklessness in the extreme.
he is very, very not smart.
a twisted example of evil trumping good.

a dark irony
imprisoned and tortured
celebrating 9/11

… imagination must not be married to real power.

the Ku Klux Klan will play 100,000 times on cable
and who knows how many million times on social media.

a con man, a fake — thank you.
there are more bombshells
he will never ever … Never.

democracy
wastes,
exhausts
and murders itself.

commit suicide.

these dire predictions
anger was transformed
killing the innocent children

into the abyss …
suckers.