The Pontification of a Patriot, Circa 2012

I never understood how you believed we lived in anything other than this world of moral relativity,

of why I do,

of what you do,

of what who does what to who

I told you that what you did was wrong and that you had made a wrong turn several exits back,

back before the overpass,

before the passing lane,

before these signs started saying no passing

If I was on the right and you were on the left in this wicked game of musical chairs, did that mean that the elephant and the donkey couldn't play house the way we had learned to,

to read between the lines,

to sleep with the enemy time and again,

to do things that are wrong because they feel right,

If I wore red, white, and blue, and I spewed the last harangues of the Boston Tea Party, would you deem me a patriot,

and then I would play the license game alone,

with no help,

with no capital,

with no pedestal to lodge my irreverent complaint

with no Jimmy to glamorize the filibuster,

to say that nice guys always finish first these days

because they don't,

not since Tuesday in 2001,

not since Tuesday in 2008,

If I stood up on a podium and gave you my ominous jeremiad, you would laugh, and all the while, the rolling thunder in the distance would hear my lingering cry