We’ve been thinking a lot lately about tyranny: what it looks like, where it comes from, and how it roots itself in the culture and sprouts into a choking kudzu when too many people aren’t paying attention.

Here’s a poem by W.H. Auden, who lived from 1907 to 1973.

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Epitaph on a Tyrant

Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after,
And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;
He knew human folly like the back of his hand,
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;
When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,
And when he cried the little children died in the streets.

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If you’d like to read some astute analysis on this poem, check out the Interesting Literature blog here.