Friday, February 19, 2021

Prose Poem: Thomas K. Plofchan and the Impenetrable Wall of Interlocking Plastic Bricks.

 



Thomas K. Plofchan ran away from home

at the the age of fifteen.

He made his way to a West Virginia 

coal mine, where he worked as an 

underground mechanic for six years.

Then he joined the Army and

served with distinction in Afghanistan.

He was honorably discharged in 2016,

and somehow wangled his way

into law school.

He passed the Bar in 2019.

Now he was sitting here

in front of me,

smoking a meerschaum pipe,

while I interrogated him.


I shuffled through his file

one more time, while I gathered

my thoughts.

"You have quite an impressive record"

I told him.

"No comment" was all he would reply.

"Do you know why you're here?" I asked him.

"No comment"

"And that you face a minimum of twenty years

in a maximum security prison if found guilty?" I 

rasped harshly. I was getting sick of his lack

of cooperation.

He needed to know I could do more

than just polish truncheons.


"My mouth and my stomach are

disconnected" he finally said.

"What?" I asked him.

"My mouth feels hungry even

when my stomach is full" he continued.

"Are you trying to obfuscate things?"

I asked him sternly.

He leaped out of his chair like a madman.

"There! I knew it!" he exclaimed.

"With that kind of a vocabulary

You're no more a barbarian than I am."

I tried to hide my blushes, but couldn't.

"Why, thank you" I said. "No one has said

anything so kind to me in years."

"You're just the kind of person we can use in our organization"

he whispered to me in small fonts.

"How so?" I asked him, in the same manner.


Once he explained things to me I began to see how mistaken

my unquestioning obedience to the state had been.

So I helped him escape.

We fled in an unmarked Agency car.

With my help, Plofchan's group was able

to hack into Lego's data base --

so the next time we march on the Capital,

it will be behind an impenetrable wall 

of interlocking plastic bricks.

THEN we'll see who laughs last . . . 



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