Nocturnes: Gone The Neighborhood

Our nearest neighbors were (to use the most

polite wording) unpleasant.  They controlled

a vast amount of land, fertile and well

watered.  But they divided it a long

time past, and subdivided even more

among their numerous descendents (most

of whom were envious of some relative

or other).  Some of their comic squabbles

had escalated to sad tragedy---

death at worst, or some crippling injury.

They often argued over certain gods

in whom they had believed, and on whom they

had often staked their very destinies:

Money, and Brute Force were the gods of whom

they spoke of most, and tried hardest to please.

Of course, some lived far better than their kin,

and this created violent jealousy

of produce, wealth, and sometimes even how

to reproduce.  I think their broadcasts told

the honest, and profoundest, truth about

them:  in these vignettes, they portrayed themselves

as upright heroes . . . dastard villians . . . or

comic buffons (this latter was the most

correct).  Then, recently, they summoned one

who spoke more foolishly, and with bombast,

than ever they, or we, had heard before.

And this clown---glowing orange from the most

conflicted passions (like a young bully

passed over by maturity's process)---

ordered the detonation of a bomb

ensheathed in cobalt that released the force---

the primal fire---that keeps our star alight

(though it is very distant from our home,

and gleams but precious little through our days).

Our neighbors' home (safely distant from ours)

is shrouded in a sparkling, radiant fog

the color of their steel, and deadlier,

for it has slain all forms of life thereon.

It is too far away to have effect

upon our surfaces as they present

their red appearance.  That small sphere, though once

so green and blue, and lovely in our sky,

is dead by its inhabitants' unbound

lust to obtain, and hold, the final word.

We are alone now, without neighbors to

distract us from our own immense malaise

on this dull home that never changes its

identifying color tones---the same

always.  But stare at that gray sphere, up there,

so blue and green it once was; now, dull gray.

Thus, you can understand why we can be

content with what is ours; much like a phrase.

a catchphrase that our fomer neighbors used

some five decades of their years  ago---

and much repeated in their media;

ironic these words, "Better red than dead."

Author's Notes/Comments: 

Lest their overly literal reader takes offense, the finai line is offered as a "punchline."  I do not, in any way, believe in, endorse, promote, or devote myself to Marxism, Communish, Fascism, Leninism, Stalinism, or any other -ism that threatens (openly or covertly) the peace and freedoms of the Christian churches.

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