Another false prophet, another beast --
Another peace process for the Middle East . . .
Another massacre, a newer war;
A bright new scarlet global *****.
Another poem, another curse
A further plunge from worst to worse . . .
Another sociopathic brute,
Another ***** in a business suit.
Another smiling psychopath;
Another angel's bowl of wrath
Another data-driven plan
To twist yet further fallen man . . .
A bolder data-driven lie
As LUCIFER ascends the sky,
Another depression, another bust--
In MAMMON we supremely TRUST !

So you got robbed. Don't think of yourself as a victim. Look at it as an expression of the robber's occupational and social deficits. Don't let it traumatize you for life. After all, can you compare it to being murdered? We need to have some appreciation for scale here. We don't want to go back to the Victorian notion that people are fragile flowers who can't handle  having a gun pointed at them and losing a few dollars. That's a form of condescension, after all.

You're complaining about a burglary? Some men see a mere doorknob lock as a flirtation. And surely we don't want to see the end of flirtations and seductions!  Must we all now install deadbolts and security systems? What's next--chastity belts? What happened to joie de vivre and devil-may-care?

So a drunk driver hit your car. Do you really want to have him arrested? It was a misunderstanding; he didn't realize that four cocktails and driving are technically illegal. And should they be? Do we want to criminalize ordinary reckless behavior? Haven't we all done something a bit foolish or clumsy in our younger days? Do we want a society in which everyone has to be careful what they do, all the time? A society in which people must count their drinks before getting behind the wheel? We are moving away from the ideals of a liberal democracy and toward totalitarianism! 

So you were murdered. You can look at is as an opportunity to learn more about what happens after death. Your career was ended and your earthly form deteriorated, but that's not the end of the world. Now you live as a memory, and people appreciate you more. What doesn't **** you makes you stronger, and what kills you enshrines. There is honor in being dead. It is time we brought back the old virtues!

I bade sunlight to linger on,
her hot sweet kiss upon my skin,
For every time I find her gone
I doubt I'll see her back again

Here in the winter of my heart
The ice crawls deep across my flesh
And sunlight, love, had to depart
To leave me blue, my torment fresh

How I long to hear the sound
Of icy crackling window panes
And feel her warmth, though past the clouds
Turn sleet and snow to soothing rain.

I bade sunlight to come again
Renew my soul and thaw my heart
But darkness seems my lot in life
I've felt her light and warmth depart.

I am Ma’am.
Ma’am I am.
And if I order
green eggs and ham
at the café,
you can say,
“We don’t serve that here,
Ma’am.”

Miss, I’m not.
I am not Miss.
That appellation
is a dis.
Take a look,
and you’ll see this:
I’m 53, not 18.
I may be older than I seem,
but my days of girlhood are long gone.
And to call me “Miss” would just be wrong.
So call me “Ma’am;” it’s what I am.
You might think “Miss” is hip or flip,
but if you call me that there’ll be no tip.

I lost my Left leg at Bull Run and came home from the war.
With a peg I managed farm work; unfit for battle; not for chores.
My neighbor, Reid, did also bleed in that War Between the States.
His right leg was mangled below the knee- they had to amputate.
Now, each year, we go into town and buy one pair of shoes.
My neighbor, Reid, wears the same size and likes the boots I choose.
We’ve become fast friends, the two of us; our children something more.
My son has bought a ring to give to the girl who lives next door.
In wartime we were enemies; fighting for the Blue and Gray.
Now our womenfolk make plans for our children’s wedding day.
Here, in the autumn of our lives, all enmity is defused.
Each has learned to know and love his foe- by walking in his shoe.