It would be evil,
they say,
to tell it true.
I know they are wrong,
they know they are wrong,
but it comforts them to think so,
or at least to say so.

The most terrible men,
the most irredeemable women,
live now, lived then.
When one thing gets better,
two get worse, another laughs,
and a fifth goes to sleep.

The impulse to believe is corrosive,
I believe.
It is easy to see the world
as a series of attempted persuasions,
to see love as serendipity, not coincidence.

I can carry a smooth stone in one hand
and an irregular stone in the other,
and if I trip, I will fall before I will drop them.
My grip is the only thing of which I am certain.

Let us acknowledge and celebrate
the great and noble sacrifice
that accomplishes nothing.

How much conflict is written in
to satisfy the need for drama?

Some are enriched, some enraged.