Idlers are Rarer

Destruction is the locus
Of control, the unforeseen—
Which among these things won’t last?

A gules heraldic bouquet
Of wildflowers in the desert,
Sanguinary in scorched straw?

An idler by the wayside,
A reformer at the court,
A chief of a police state,

A principled prediction?
Don’t try it. Yes, it’s tempting
To forecast the tyrant’s fall,

The law of unintended
Consequences for control.
Maybe the last survivors

Will be the red wildflowers,
Maybe the button-pushers
In their bunkers first to go.

Control is an obsessive
Narrative out of control.
But it’s not under control.

All you can guess for certain
Is that the urge to control
Endures longer than control,

And people cling to power
Every bit as desperately
As wildflowers cling to this hill.

But you’d know more about this
Than we would. Isn’t that so,
Wang Anshi, you graveless ghost?