submitted for your approval in poetry

sometimes I wonder if someone
maybe myself maybe someone else
some tail-end Generation X-er
if one of us were granted a wish
we didn’t know it but we got a wish
and not knowing the power we held
we just thoughtlessly blurted out
“I wish there was more Star Wars”
and like
it was like a monkey’s paw thing
it was like a Twilight Zone thing
it was like a genie twisting a wish
to the letter of the law to punish us

YOU WANT MORE STAR WARS, MORTAL?
the genie would bellow
YOU CAN HAVE ALL THE STAR WARS IN THE WORLD
AND IT WILL MOSTLY BE FUCKING TERRIBLE
the genie would smirk
like a parent catching you smoking
and making you finish the carton right there
like wishing for time to read a whole library
and your glasses breaking in the doorway there
YOU WILL GET MOUNTAINS AND MOUNTAINS
OF DUMB THOUGHTLESS KIDDIE FAN FIC
AND THE BACKSTORIES OF PEOPLE WE
ONLY KNOW THE NAMES OF FROM THE
GODDAMN TOY PACKAGE BACKINGS

man, like, we really wasted this wish
because I don’t care to watch
a six episode miniseries on Disney Plus
about Yoda’s dentist
I don’t need a five seasons about
Darth Maul’s nephew Little Stevie Maul
I don’t need a grand movie trilogy
about Mon Motha’s gynecologist
I don’t, I just don’t
we had this fine little story
this arc from Luke as a bored farmer
to Luke holding his mostly-redeemed father
dying in his arms at the end of a war
and it was beautiful
and it was complete
and everything else is just
fan-fiction with a corporate blessing
and it waters down everything good
and it guilds the once-fine lily
and it’s just product to consume

and I wonder if this was all my fault
I wonder if this was my wish I wasted
1994 outside the Carneys Corners video store
I wished that we could have more Star Wars
and I could’ve wished for world peace
and I could’ve wished for true love
and I could’ve wished my father back to life
but instead I wished for more Star Wars
and we got us decades and decades
of endless terrible Star Wars
oh, man, I hope it wasn’t me
let’s hope we can blame someone else
for this awful M. Night Shaymalan twist
of infinite terrible Star Wars