The Oblique Throne

Beneath the veneer of gilded eminence,
Where banners whisper of liberty’s pretense,
An insidious pestilence threads its way,
A labyrinthine decay in the guise of sway.
Bribes clink like spectral bells in the void,
Transactions muttered, destinies destroyed.
Thus, the calculus of corruption unfurls
A calculus steeped in gilded whorls.

Men anointed by the faceless tide
Bargain the marrow of nations with pride.
Nepotistic skeins entangle the just,
And cronyistic engines corrode the trust.
What laws emerge from such infernal looms?
Whose parchment bears complicit dooms?
In this somber forge, the public’s yoke
Frays into shadows, besieged and broke.

The throne’s promise, an odious masque,
Forges the semblance of democracy’s task.
Votes transfigured to tokens of artifice,
Each cast a pawn in an orchestrated vice.
Gerrymanders cleave maps to disarray,
While patronage barters light for gray.
Thus, sovereignty splinters in silence profound,
While treachery thrives on consecrated ground.

Judicial robes, once sanctified veils,
Are smirched by lucre’s clandestine trails.
Edicts writ with fraudulent ink
Condemn the powerless to the brink.
Selective gazes through justice’s blindfold
Render rulings bitter and manifold.
Beneath these drapes, collusion breeds,
And sacred balances succumb to greed.

The market burgeons, a citadel vile,
Where corporate titans barter and beguile.
Their whispers ensnare the architects of law,
Warping frameworks with unseen claw.
Avarice begets a mercantile caste,
Their silken tongues eroding fast
The citadel meant for the many’s good,
Turned charnel house where ethics once stood.

In vaults of war, the theater expands,
Funds diverted by invisible hands.
Coffers swell with ignoble gain,
While shadows bloom across terrain.
Eyes unbidden, in espionage's stare,
Lay bare the innocent, unaware.
Security’s banner frays with time,
Its purity tarnished by secret crime.

Earth’s bones fracture as greed ascends,
Forests wilt where corruption bends.
Mountains crumble for veins of ore,
Rivers darken to their very core.
The soil we tread is sold for scrap,
And humanity weaves its own entropic trap.
Nature whispers her dirges low,
Yet her pleas to deafened hearts bestow.

Through tongues of silver, the truth is slain,
And propaganda curdles in hearts and brains.
The press becomes a polished marionette,
Each string tightened in networks clandestine set.
Through polished lips, deception flows,
While beneath, the common man’s despair grows.
The masses, dulled by perpetual plight,
Forget their power to ignite the night.

Yet within this miasma of iniquitous schemes,
Lies dormant the ember of collective dreams.
For the oblique throne may crumble still,
If hearts ignite with sovereign will.
To those who guard the helm’s decree,
Let vigilance temper complicity.
For liberty demands a righteous hand,
To steer the ship and heal the land.

The obelisk of corruption teeters high,
Its shadows claw the unfurled sky.
But empires fall when truth takes root,
And nations rise when justice suits.
So rise, O seeker of better fates,
Unshackle the bonds of corrupted states.
For the throne is but a mortal guise,
And its rot dissolves when the people rise.