Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Dara Wier’s "Independence Day" is a darkly ironic meditation on autonomy, governance, and the cyclical absurdity of collective decision-making. The poem is structured as a series of repetitions, where the community attempts to exercise free will and self-determination but continually finds itself returning to the same flawed dynamics. With a dry, satirical tone, Wier critiques both the illusion of progress and the ritualized nature of democracy, where power structures remain unchanged despite the appearance of choice.

The poem opens with an almost nonsensical failure: “We'd incorporated a laundry lending motion / Detector into the third figure without success.” The phrase is cryptic, yet the introduction of a motion detector suggests a mechanism designed to track movement, to determine action—perhaps an allegory for attempting to measure or control free will. The fact that this experiment fails sets the stage for the larger theme of frustration and stagnation.

Following this failure, “Everyone commenced dispersing themselves back / To their homes all dejected.” This dispersal signals a loss of momentum, a return to private spaces after a failed collective effort. The next few lines introduce images of destruction and loss: “Many fires were set, much ice was cut, a few / Links fell away, a key attached to a braided / Horsehair bracelet got left behind.” The setting of fires and cutting of ice suggest drastic, opposing actions—heat and cold, chaos and preservation. The mention of lost keys and “links” suggests broken connections, reinforcing the idea that something is being abandoned or forgotten.

Midnight arrives, and with it, “unbraided”—another image of unraveling, disorder, dissolution. But despite these disconnections, the people insist on their “free will”: “Everyone spent the next three days practicing / Free will. They insisted on it. They lived by it.” The irony here is palpable. Free will, rather than being a natural state, is something “practiced”—as though it requires rehearsal, as though it is performative rather than innate.

Then, the poem shifts into its refrain of selection by drawing straws: “If no one volunteers we can draw straws.” The randomness of the act underscores the arbitrary nature of leadership selection. But even before the leader is chosen, the poem hints at a lurking disturbance: “Something we suspected not all that pretty was happening / In the cellar. That would have to be saved for later.” The cellar becomes a recurring image, representing the hidden, the suppressed, the unexamined truths of this society.

The consensus is reached, and it “looked as if it were perfect.” But perfection is immediately questioned: “But was it a solution?” This brief, cutting inquiry encapsulates the entire poem’s skepticism—consensus does not equate to resolution. The community moves seamlessly from agreement to denial: “Everyone spent the next several days in denial. / Or at least that’s what our leader said we were in—” Wier calls attention to the power of language to define reality: the leader dictates that they are in denial, thereby making it so.

Then comes another round of straw-drawing, and, unsurprisingly, “once again it was our old leader who / Drew the shortest straw. And we were back to square one.” Despite the ritual of selection, nothing changes. The phrase “back to square one” is intentionally rejected: “But we refused to call it that, we called it progress.” The biting satire here suggests how societies justify stagnation, rebranding redundancy as forward movement.

The leader’s exasperation follows: “You idiots, our leader said, what have you done with the / Consensus?” The very thing they sought to establish has been squandered. This leads to collective shame: “This caused us every one to become exceedingly / Sheepish.” The choice of “sheepish” is telling, as it connotes both embarrassment and blind conformity—qualities that stand in direct contrast to the free will they had so fervently claimed.

Then, in one of the poem’s most chilling turns, the people turn to mourning: “Everyone spent the next several months hanging crepe.” Crepe paper, traditionally used for funerals, suggests that instead of pursuing actual change, the community resigns itself to grief. Even this, however, is dictated by the leader: “That’s what our leader said we should do for the rest / Of our lives.” Their subjugation is total.

But then, instead of drawing straws again, they escalate: “No, we set the straw on fire.” This act of destruction signals rebellion, but it is a rebellion that leads not to freedom but to further horror: “It started in the cellar.” The previously unspoken horrors that had been saved for later are now ignited—“Old milk cartons, filters, dead animals, it was a / Ghoul’s soup down there.” The cellar—a place of suppressed truth—now becomes the site of chaos, its grotesque contents erupting into the open.

The final irony comes in the response to this catastrophe: “And we made up glorious anthems / To praise the courage of our leader.” Instead of rejecting the failed leader, instead of learning from the inferno they have unleashed, they glorify him. Their instinct is not to change but to mythologize, to wrap themselves in the familiar comfort of glorious anthems—as if praise could erase failure.

Wier’s "Independence Day" is a masterful deconstruction of governance, democracy, and the collective delusions of a society trapped in cycles of ineffective leadership. The repeated process of drawing straws, re-electing the same leader, and calling regression progress reflects a political reality where change is often illusory. The satire is sharp, exposing how people cling to the appearance of agency while remaining bound to the same entrenched patterns.

The poem also critiques the performative nature of free will—how it is practiced, insisted on, rather than genuinely exercised. The community’s repeated failures to alter their course, their deference to authority, and their eventual descent into destruction mirror real-world systems that claim to be democratic but are, in practice, stagnant.

The cellar functions as a metaphor for the unexamined underbelly of any society—the place where its darkest realities fester. Initially ignored, it ultimately consumes them, yet rather than confront this truth, they transform it into a ghoul’s soup and proceed to praise their leader. This final moment encapsulates how societies rewrite failure as heroism, how history is manipulated to uphold the status quo.

The poem’s title, "Independence Day", is thus deeply ironic. Instead of celebrating autonomy, the poem depicts a world where freedom is an illusion, where people are locked in patterns of deference, denial, and ultimately self-destruction. What begins as an attempt at governance ends in fire and empty praise. Wier’s poem leaves us with the unsettling realization that true independence—true change—may never come at all.

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