Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com
Dispatches for the Colonial Office


People are Dying by the Thousands – Let’s All Go Buy Slogan Tees

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                    Domestic carnage now filled all the year
                    With Feast-days; the old Man from the chimney nook,
                    The Maiden from the ***** of her Love,
                    The Mother from the Cradle of her Babe,
                    The Warrior from the Field – all perish’d, all

       -Wordsworth, The Prelude, 1805-1806, Book X, 356-360

We busy ourselves in our accustomed ways:
Dishes to wash, the still-green lawn to be mowed
The vacuum cleaner to annoy the household pup
A book, a chair, a reverie, a glass of tea

But then

The evening news is a call to our conscience
With offerings in two senses only
Tastefully muted sounds and filtered visuals
Across a couch with a motorized recline mode

Dead bodies fuzzed out on the evening news
And peace-loving intellectuals chanting
                                                       “Gas the Jews!”