Fear Utopia Poem by David Welch

The age-old dream is a nightmare,
that has haunted us far too long,
still it lures in so many souls
with the sweetness of its song.
But beyond the simple melody
a darkness quickly appears,
those who preach of utopia
are the ones we should most fear.

It all starts out pleasant enough,
they want to build the perfect world,
with peace, love, and prosperity,
for every single boy and girl.
But on what defines perfection,
the can never truly agree,
tell them it's abstract idea,
and they scream out ‘heresy! '

Not that this will stop the push,
they're convinced that they're right,
and any who would oppose them,
are an evil and a blight.
First it's campaigns to convince
that they hold the greatest truth,
then to the schools for targeting
the dumb, impressionable youth.

They think that this will do the job,
but too many reject and dismiss,
then comes all the social pressure,
go along or you're not ‘with it.'
And when even that doesn't prevail,
they always turn to government,
use law to force you to agree,
or face a long imprisonment.

This becomes the tipping point,
since government is always force,
yet convinced they'll bring perfection,
they'll do what was once abhorred.
Some penalties put you in camps,
doomed to a miserable fate,
no longer do you just ‘disagree, '
you're now enemy of the state.

It does not take much to see this,
such an endless, brutal trend,
Hitler's ‘perfect' Aryan Reich
sent ten million to their end.
And all those workers ‘paradises, '
their purges and class enemies,
Sent a hundred million folk to death,
to build their ‘ideal' societies.

Even down on the smaller scale,
the same result you will find,
Jamestown, Heaven's Gate, and Waco;
where people were burned alive.
How many would still be with us,
how many fewer would be dead,
if we could take utopia
and drive it clear out of our heads?

In fact the very word itself,
if you look back on history,
literally translates as ‘no place, '
in the original Greek.
As in no place can ever exist
where mankind lives perfect,
Better is the best we can do
without leaving people wrecked.

Best we keep shouting this truth out
before we all tumble and fall,
We must fear, fear utopia,
or else it will kill us all.