India, July 26 -- Dear Reader,

I want to write about protest poetry, about protest memes and protest satire. About the power of words, and about naming that-which-should-not-be-named.

All week at home we have been discussing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: the story of the students against the Ministry of Magic. Political appointees like Dolores Umbridge seizing control. The threats of violence from the Death Eaters. The parallels with real life feel uncanny.

My phone pings. It is a poem from a hundred years ago. About a cockroach. Written by the American Don Marquis, and titled The Hen and the Oriole.

Another ping, another poem-a tongue-in-cheek Conversation with a Cockroach by Indra Narayan Das. The cockroach, inspiration...