ILLUSION

The theater curtain has been opened
Pouring out are the vanguards of change

And the guardians of status quo ---
A bevy of coquettish beauties
Skilled in verbal foreplay
And shinning like a thousand fireflies

They carry idealized portraits of their principals
With pomp and pageantry
And beguile their simple-hearted audience
With gaseous oratory .
They flirt and flatter the delirious crowd
With sweet-sounding words
They inflame their emotions and defuse their tension
With rousing rhetoric that cloak their dark impulses
And hide their daredevil decadent past

Oh, this is a festive season
Season of tall tales
And scurrilous stories
Season of cherry-coloured lies
And inane innuedoes
Season of prophetic sinsong
And chorus of phony predictions
Season of stirring speeches
Encrusted with slapstick comedies
And sentimental platitudes