Hapless Gaff

The teleprompter tumbles in the clamorous migration of doting interns and banner-waving believers, as the majority rallies yet again toward fervor behind pitch-black sound bites guaranteed to stir frothing complacency of thought. As the seconds stretch in the arc of gravity, the press core readies their cut-to-tape excuses while half the bodies on stage begin talking to their sleeves with darting eyes hushed behind nearly opaque lenses until the shattering collapse and surrender of yet another useful tool to destruction. Thousands of eyes turn in absolute unison to beseech the captain for a message to resonate, to cut the pasteurized void left in the breath of calm between his mid-sentence message about the importance of maintaining calm in the face of financial adversity and that shocking interruption bound by clumsy circumstance in tumble. Instead of recognizing such folly with human understanding, he lowers his eyes in silence while whisked away in a swift procession of escape.