The Forest Rests

 

Dusk's soft grey entrance has tamed the wind's

raging tantrum, the signal for nature's elements

to recede and set aside their querulous 

misgivings over haphazard signals given the

day now at rest and so must they. The forest sighs

its relief as the atmosphere stills and settles.

Its canopy dishevelled by broken boughs and

cracked bark littering the forest floor's fresh

fallen comforter from last night's snowfall. 

The silhouette of gaunt trees shed of their glory

loom against an imminently-abandoned sky

the luminous ball of the sun retreating over the

horizon. A faint murmur of birds nesting for the

night, and soon the dark cloak of night descends.

 

 

His Stage

All the world's a stage

and Canada's premier thespian

plans to tread the boards on every one

to the delectation of aficionados

of the art form of narcissistic 

adoration in living colour.

Naturally endowed in lavish

entitlement he wallows in praise

of his tasteful expressions of cultural

and national solidarity donning

garish costumery offsetting his 

radiant personality as a world-class

Prince Charming capable of 

seducing an adoring woman

with his eyes alone yet pivoting on a dime

to sensuously confide his trust

one world leader to another. The

world is also his oyster

not to be overlooked his dedication

to feminism, environmentalism

omnigenderphilia and an flagrant

generosity of flinging treasury

at any problems the world encounters

for he is also Everyman in an actor's frame.

Winter-Bound

I've been where the Ice Queen reigns

where the dome of the sky when she is

in residence shines its silvery hue below

and her courtiers are never distant from

her command, the disciples of deep winter.

Snow sits obediently at her dainty blue feet

and Wind communes above with Sleet

and Snow awaiting her orders on any given

winter day. Her diaphanous mantle of

scintillating silver borrowed from the sky

spread sedately about her she observes her

queenly estate festooned in a fine filigree

of lacework shimmering from tree steeple

to fast-frozen forest brook meandering the

sleeping garden of her winter-bound estate.

 

 

Encounters

It was at one of those gatherings of the old farts

and frat boys powerful leaders of the world, free and

otherwise to discuss matters of great moment such as 

wars and economies and pandemics. An opportunity 

for leaders of opposing values and controversial actions 

to briefly meet and ventilate grievances face to face in 

private diplomacy. An unscheduled opportunity between 

a tyrannical leader and one who aspired to nominal 

dictatorship a fawning sycophant under pressure to

express his nation's dim view of oppressive, interfering 

governments overstepped the boundaries of finesse to 

provoke a bonfire of recriminatory retorts verging on

threat where adversaries bare tooth and claw in their 

custodianship of national unity and self-preservation.

Strangely enough the international incident at the

hallowed conference elicited cheers in both nations.

Dominion of Restraint .

 

The influence of small towns on the

character and behaviour of its residents

is a matter of historical nostalgia, places

where, as villages gathering farmers and

craftspeople together in a common area

where all were known to one another

resulted in a community of personalities

where the perennial divisive crank was

identified along with the meek mild

tempered man living with the harridan

and the local professionals in law and

medicine and church represented the

refined gentry, mercantile interests held

by those of exotic backgrounds and any

whiffs of impropriety sniffed out by

those with arcane talents from whom

nothing could be hidden. Proliferating

by word of mouth and a movable press

naming, blaming and shaming might

convince all and sundry to improve mode

of conduct lest local law enforcement be

moved to custodianship. That world of 

tight community surrendered to a world

where the population pool is immense

no longer confined to towns and villages 

of yore, where scandals and anti-social 

events of psychotic dimension continually 

flavour the news. The intimacy of belonging 

evaporated, the flamboyant flaunting of

celebrity absent moral boundaries reigns.

 

 

Shifting Humanity

 

Yesterday is becoming today and soon

may be tomorrow. Generations to come

will see the past in their future, one of

post-nationalism. Gone will be the nations

of today and yesterday to be replaced by

the tribes of ancient history. The world is

becoming a melting pot where nations are 

diluted by the urgent demand of unstoppable

migration. The world is on the move as one

after another failed nations are depleted

their populations drifting after promising

prospects elsewhere. Receiving nations in

disarray incapable of holding back the tide

of swarming humanity seeking prosperity.

Will the eventuating melting pot finally

solve humanity's inequalities and render

conflict extinct? Consider this: tribal and

religious verities are exclusionary, with

them arrive suspicion and consuming hate.

Rife with the inheritance of primal drives

the savagery of instinctual preservation 

surmounts all alternate emotions; enter 

conflict and carnage to the soul of the

human collective fragmented and hostile.

 

 

Gifting an Unworthy World

Isn't it just wickedly, hilariously

satisfying to harass and slander Jews

sitting ducks in their cocoons of 

uncertainty over whether the world

will ever relent and view them with

the dispassion of disinterest, but in the

meanwhile their presence here and

there distant from the land that birthed

them offers them up as fodder for all

who feed at the trough of malevolence

ascribing to Jews all the miseries and

faults of fortune their detractors live with

taking pleasure in fomenting the rancid

bile of hate splattering its venom happily

foregoing moral verities for the comic's

healing balm found in victimizing others.