We are the overlords and we call the shots!
We decide just who and what gets in
and who and what does not
no matter how distinctly unworthy the ins
or overtly deserving the outs.

We are the gatekeepers and our word is law!
We have carte blanche to duct tape the mouths
of writers we'd rather
no ears ever heard or eyes ever saw
— we are the gatekeepers; we are the law!

As the elite troops of groupthink enforcement
having spent our lives reliably conforming
to all the sycophantic backslapping demands
of top-drawer establishment whoredom;
having been gladly seduced by the tenured fruits
of its hush-money comfort and privilege

only we have CV's sufficiently distinguished
to highlight careers spent lying prostrate
before our god and master Mammon.

Only we have the wisdom and learning
and the connoisseur’s taste to determine
what anemic obedient works
to include in the sacrosanct canon
— only we are licensed to handle the practice
of conferring status and bestowing prestige.

We are the gatekeepers — the culture cops!
We promote writings no right minds would read.
We compose blurbs and citations so fraught
with absurdly superlative froth
that halfwits alone would be prone to believe;

reviews so stuffed with sumptuous fudge
they prove as a rule to be much bigger fictions
than the fictions presumably being judged.

Enamoured with all that's flaccid
aficionados of all that's in fashion
backers of the fastidiously inoffensive
mediocrity's unflagging champions
lovers of all things politically-correctly-pretentious

only we have the right to decree what is shite
and what's bad and what's good and what's great.

We are the gatekeepers. We make the rules
and we alone are empowered to choose
just what and who gets to pass through the gates.