King, of course! Or . . .

The word fool does mean jester too, and with its more contemporary, ableist shadings, seems ripe for neuropunk re-appropriation, so let’s begin.

I’d rather be the fool. And I hope you you’d rather be one with me, fellow fool.

What do fools do that kings cannot? Or at least, not so well.

A king might put on a vanity play starring himself, and all his subjects will roar when he jokes about what sad, ugly arses they are.

(That is in fact the entirety of the joke: that they are sad, ugly arses.)

But the subjects’ roars are lies. They just don’t want him to whip or to kill them.

Fools, though, dance at–no–on the feet of kings, and sing about what stinks beneath the velvet robes and behind the many-paneled doors.

What stinks, why it stinks, how it stinks, how much it stinks . . .

A fool’s songs bust open windows and signal more fools to the gates.

Fools have no idea what’s going on, though, because . . . fools.

(Fools know entirely what’s going on, and make sure everyone else who needs to know it knows it too.)

A fool’s voice is a stripper.

A fool’s voice is an organ.

A king’s voice is a bludgeon.

A king’s voice is, at best, a whining saw.

(He can only ever save the bells and glitter in his voice if he dies a prince.)

Bells and glitter are the things a fool wears on her body.

They might also be the first things she flings on the fire when the castle burns.

Or not. Her choice.

When the castle really begins to burn, a fool only laughs at her own wounds, not at yours.

(A fool knows when to work with silence.)

Fools roll their way together out of the fire, singing. Foolishly alive.

They bring the king with them, if he’ll be a fool.

So will you be a fool?