Volatile Voltaire
once said something I believed,
but I've forgotten what it used to be.
Some candide (candied?) little thing,
sweet and soft spoken, recited it to me
like a national anthem without the music
I wasn't up to facing, anyways.
An influx of responses filled the dashboard
of my fighter phone as I wove among
dogfights, catfights over who's in the right
and who he was in that first that night.
He just stands like a complacent general
off to one side, directing troops of decision.
He didn't want a D-Day.
There's so much more to life than
brass ranking you earn by not taking a brass bullet.
Let your best friend do that.
He had no aspirations.
(Cleopatra had aspirations.)