The Failed Revolution Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

The Failed Revolution

In my childhood’s town there was one neon light on top of a five storey building:
“Jesus Saves.” I asked mother what Jesus saved.”Souls, ” she said without looking
up, she was reading the communist manifesto, dreamed of the day when workers
would take over factories and throw into prison the obese capitalists. She tried to
emigrate, to the Soviet Union, but was turned down, she had no skills other than
putting sardines into a tin. Mother made rice pudding that day and I was allowed
to scrap the brown sticky residue in the pot. A famous rich capitalist is in jail,
in Siberia, It is nice place he has internet, sits in his shirt sleeves sends emails to
friends protesting his innocence. Accused of stealing oil from his own company,
I wonder how this is possible. No, not the revolution mother was dreaming about.