The first celebrity lookalike took screws to palms and soles;
he lashed his own back and barbed his own brow;
asked Mags to confirm the resemblance and she bowed,
fingertips grazing his toes.
The first celebrity lookalike believed
in the power of his originator, indeed —
but 24 hours, and then 48, and feeling the weight of a worried mass
bear several cubits of splinters on his pre-cut traps,
he realized action must be taken.
“Now what are we supposed to believe in?”
And the first celebrity lookalike approached his pack,
all gristle and glory, begging the believed, and then was he.
The people needed proof, and here was he,
dripping out pallid before them. No mirror tricks.
Just Grand Old Jack.
And how could they deny? He was that he was.

The first celebrity lookalike would become the Old Grand
in die Vorstellung of the Brave New Wasteland.
He is whitewash warped — his hands are where his knees should be,
his heart is where his head should be,
his mouth is where his mind should be.
He has blue eyes.
His eternal words spill out like sanguine gold
on foil-edged pages, sentiments unfollowed,
least not i’the name of glorious Grand Old.
His Wasteland party dances ‘round the ring
all thinking of themselves alone as master,
neglectful of the famished lions,
the lions fed cabbage-cabbage soup á la king.
“It is finished,” the originator cried, the night he died.
And he was right.
Then it started happening to everybody.