The Longest Yet The Shortest Night Poem by Chen-ou Liu

a 4-tanka sequence

'once upon a time
Rome was a Republic'...
my teacher laments
gazing at the White House
in the gathering dark

'the dumb, no,
dumbest trade war in history'...
with news on mute
I see the MAGA neighbor
piling up boxes of eggs

this storm of thoughts
in my recurring dream
King Trump's head
sliced open with nothing in it
except a wall nut

warm bedside light --
Isaac Asimov flies me
into the Milky Way
to mind-witness the fall
of a galactic empire