Back to Basics

Our primitive past remains alive and well
in the tribal instincts it evokes within the
subconscious wellsprings of those clinging
to ancient ritual, none so virulently raw
as vengeance and the drive to restore honour
equated with all humanly virtues despite that
restoration's primary requirement is hounding
threatening and committing bloody slaughter
to slake the ravening monster residing within
the minds and traditions that call upon the
reputedly wronged to right the tribal insult
and thus normalcy in socially mandated
violence to satisfy the rituals of religious
devotion to a wrathful, jealous god whose
lightning strikes of lethal force set the standard
for believers who invoke the sacred name of
the almighty under whose banner they commit
atrocities whose purpose is to restore the
balance residing in the tribal pathology of
deadly commitment to destruction and
blood-letting recalling the dimly shrouded
past when survival equated with destroying
competition for scarce natural commodities
to secure life and deny it one's enemies.