Poem: "The Graffiti War"

[ysabetwordsmith]

This poem was prompted and sponsored by minor_architect. It takes a gritty yet whimsical look at a science fiction classic, aliens-invade-Earth.

The Graffiti War

When the Gkarr came to conquer Earth
they took care to destroy
the radios and televisions,
the phones and computers,
so as to cut off communication.
They confiscated books
and punished people for writing.
But they overlooked one thing -
graffiti.

It was not until
the first human slaves escaped
from cleaning alien toilets
and joined the resistance
that we learned why:
the Gkarr marked their territory
with colorful excretions laid out
in elaborate, abstract designs.

So we sprayed our insignia
on every boxcar and building and bridge
all over the city.
We painted the sidewalks and the streets.
There were no police left to stop us,
and the Gkarr didn’t care.

Cell to cell, we connected,
as we penned our plans minutely
into the margin of every neon signature;
every rebel learned to write fast and small
so that from a distance it looked like an outline.
Slaves passed the word cross-country
until the roads ran red with paint.

If the Gkarr caught someone at sabotage
and pressed his face to the pavement
or bounced him off a wall,
there was bound to be vital contact information
right under his nose.

We pushed back the lines,
retook what was ours, and
sprayed paint raucously over their marks
every inch of the way.

When we had finally beaten the Gkarr,
my gang stood victorious over the enemy ship
and the mayor of Chicago
personally handed us the cans
so we could tag the landing gear.