Another preventable tragedy
Shocks decency, and they all
Stand around, hands sullied,
Complicit in this constant
Violence they pretend is
Senseless but that has
Deep roots in their soiled
Thoughts and actions,
Damaged psyches unhealed,
Aggressive greed,
Retention of power
More important than
The lives of human beings.
From a place of peace,
It appears as if some
Kind of psychoses has
Taken hold where amity
Is dismissed in favor of
Base instinct, a
Miasma of fear and hate
Simmering just below
Explosion, hallucination
Induced by unhealed pain,
Dearth of understanding,
Absence of love,
Scarcity of courage.
Awful people covering
For others like them,
A putrid syndicate of
Craven aristocrats,
Defending what they’ve
Always been told is
Rightfully theirs.
It’s not out of the question
To envision our world as a
Place where human beings care for
Instead of kill each other,
Though certain misanthropes
Who profit from misery
Would certainly disagree,
All that is required is
Treating all people
As the rare and valuable
Gifts they are and letting go of
The traditional nonsense about
Being somehow different or
In competition with one another.
Rough gashes ripped
In the societal fabric,
The contract between
Fellow human beings
Shredded without a care
Solely to protect
Privileged malefactors
Who go about their day
Deriding humaneness,
Stepping on anything that
Gets in the way of
Their vulgar needs.
Her past actions
Weighed heavily on her now
As they returned to
Torment her in ways she
Had hoped they would not but
Knew were inevitable,
An outstanding debt
For unmindful decisions
Come due and payable in
Inescapable anguish.
The depths of their
Depravity is predictably
Revealed—they never really
Cared for anyone but themselves
And their own kind but always
Tried to put some kind of
Benevolent face on it.
They show their support for
A dictator in waiting,
Someone who makes their
Broken psyches throb with delight.
It all seemed to be
Going so well,
Friendly, enthusiastic interactions
Jarringly replaced by something
Very different,
Coming from a place
Not typically
Shown to strangers.
Government isn’t some
Scary monster out to
Eat you and your children,
It’s merely a reflection
Of its citizens’ priorities.
We can decide that
Altruism is important
In a civilized society,
Or that we are
Just snarling creatures
Fighting each other
For survival,
Guarding our dens.
