#title Anarchy (poem)
#author Fortner Anderson
#SORTauthors Fortner Anderson;
#date 2002
#source [[https://www.fifthestate.org/archive/358-fall-2002/anarchy-poem]]
#lang en
#pubdate 2021-05-11
#notes Fifth Estate #358, Fall, 2002

Anarchy is not Survivor, the X-Files, or the Expos home opener

Anarchy is not Starbucks, the Second Cup, or double lattes at the Croissante Royale

Anarchy is not the Kyota Accords, the World Bank, or the International Monetary Fund

.

Anarchy is not GATT, NAFTA, UNESCO, NATO, or the European Economic Community

Anarchy is not the CBC, Tele-Quebec, CTV, Global or Nightline with Ted Koppel

Anarchy is not eco-tours to Cozumel or a Club Med outside Santo Domingo

Anarchy is not Le Devoir, the Globe and Mail, and certainly not the Gazette

Anarchy is not conferred by Nobel Prize, the Governor General Award or by an Oscar

Anarchy cannot be purchased or leased with a Visa or AMEX card

Anarchy is not Viagra, Prozac, Bo-tox or, Coors

Anarchy is not produced by the internal combustion engine, analog-digital cell phones, or a Palm Pilot

Anarchy is not a state subsidized health care system

Anarchy is not minimum wage laws, public transportation, or universal daycare

Anarchy is not prison, high school, university, or Lord of the Rings

Anarchy is not General Motors or Bell helicopter or DowChemical

It is not McDonald’s fries, KFC buckets, or 2 liter bottles of Pepsi

Anarchy is not child support payments, unemployment insurance, or BS

.

Anarchy is not spiked hair, facial tattoos, or a slogan painted on an up-turned camera truck

Anarchy is not a gas mask, a helmet, or a bottle of baby oil

Anarchy is not pepper spray, water cannons, the School of the Americas,truncheons, or F-16s

Anarchy is not weddings in white, funerals in black, or registrations of live birth

.

Anarchy is not issued with a driver’s license or a passport

Anarchy is not Oedipus, one man one vote, or a brick through the window of your local Prada outlet store

Anarchy is not found in Board of Directors shareholder agreements or in on-line derivative trading

Anarchy cannot be induced through diet, not smoking or clean-living

.

Anarchy is not dependent upon hand-outs from the frightened or the guilty

Anarchy is not the despotic state, or a revolutionary new state

It is a state-of-being

Anarchy is an escape from the order of the State, and Mommy and Daddy

.

Anarchy is an escape from the tyranny of “I am”

Anarchy is release from the words that make us blind

Anarchy is a continual unleashing of desire that we have depressed, and compressed, and repressed

.

Anarchy is the impossible burden of learning everything again and again

Anarchy is the birthing in blood and cries of a new world both inside and out

.

Anarchy is the beauty and terror of all the unknown

Anarchy is the acceptance of complete responsibility for everything

.

Anarchy can only start at home

Anarchy is the here and now

Anarchy is the common and the communal and the consensual

.

Anarchy is the recognition of the necessary

Anarchy is the illumination of souls

Anarchy is the courage to live all the lives we desire together.

—Fortner Anderson (2002)