So brutally hurt inside
That the only way
He feels anything is
When he vanquishes
A foe, real or
Imagined,
Domination trying to
Stand in for love.
He’ll tell you he’s
Just fine,
Strong,
But even those who
Cover for him know
He’s not.
Run, jump, jubilant, free.
Hunker, flinch, frown, ossify.
Two outwardly normal men
Sit on a park bench.
One admires the birds in the sky
Playing a carefree game.
The other sees a small
Chance of heavy rain and
Intractable despondency.
Snatching a seat at the imposing
Exotic wood table,
Bloviating obliviously at the
Assembled underlings
Effusively and expeditiously
Commending every assertion and
Irrational pronouncement
Encased in exclusionary,
Unintelligible claptrap.
A miasma of incontinent adulation,
Widgets and metrics lain upon
The altar of vacuous selfdom.
Expending an inordinate,
Excruciating amount of
Effort, he was able to
Mistrust and vilify people
Whose sole trespass was to
Live compassionately,
Peacefully, harmoniously.
The gall of these
Interlopers, vying for
Turf, position,
Raze relations, raise a
Wall of concrete reinforced.
Clean up on the outside.
Some look forward,
Others retract.
Those who bear the burden
Of unusual courage,
Who stand in front
Of an advancing tank,
Or speak against the
Wrongs wrought by a
Corrupt despot,
Who don’t follow the
Standard rules set by
Authoritarians who have
No other aim but to
Keep them compliant,
Subservient,
Those are the people who
Recognize the immense
Pressure the machine exerts
On them when they go
Against the grain,
Advancing an unfamiliar
Alternative that scares
Tyrants to the core:
Empathy, sharing, peace.
It doesn’t go as expected,
Not that he had grand ideas
About how things would
Turn out, but it could
Definitely have gone
Better, now dealing with
A disconcerting sense of what
Might have been rather than
What actually resulted and
Must now be assimilated,
There being no other choice.
One by one,
Often in groups,
They emerge and
No one says anything.
Some day in the
Future, when sanity and
Perspective return,
People will look
Back in disbelief at
How human beings could
Let it happen
Yet again.
Musing wistfully about
An eroding golden era,
The stark contrast
Between the idyllic
Charm of the past and
A present gone awry.
It wasn’t always this way,
He explains sorrowfully,
There was a time when
People knew their station,
And everything was
More orderly.
An aging revisionist,
Hanging on to dreams
Of a place that never
Existed except in
His sheltered mind,
Unaware, subjective.
You could feel the
Moment when she
Realized that what
She needed to be happy
Was not the approval of
Some outside person
But her own love.
