Heavenless Hells & Homeless Homes

"unlove's the heavenless hell and homeless home

of knowledgeable shadows(quick to seize
each nothing which all soulless wraiths proclaim
substance;all heartless spectres,happiness)"

Condoleeza Rice made a statement today to the effect that it is the duty of democracies to "tell the world that tyranny is a crime of man." (See MSNBC article at http://famulus.msnbc.com/famulusintl/ap04-28-180748.asp?reg=americas&vts=42820051848.)

It is my personal opinion that Ms. Rice needs to give her Pradas to charity and walk the streets of DC more often before she has earned the right to tell the world anything about tyranny. If, by "tyranny," one means the unjust or abusive exercise of a governmental power to benefit itself at the expense of its citizenry, then the United States is no stranger to it. If, by "tyranny," one means a government in which a single ruler is vested with absolute power, then there are many examples in history in which a tyrant has given much better service to his people than Condoleeza Rice and her cohorts in Washington.

She continued on to say that "freedom is the universal longing of every soul." Not in my experience. In my experience, love is the longing of every soul. As a nation, we have demonstrated just how much of a heavenless hell and a homeless home unlove can create through our actions in Iraq, our lack of economic and environmental stewardship, and our unmitigated arrogance that the rest of the world would benefit from following our selfish example. The rest of the world loves us not. Why? Because we are in the winter of our discontent, making the clouds that lower over our heads.

"lovers alone wear sunlight. The whole truth
not hid by matter;not by mind revealed....

Here(only here)is freedom:always here
no then of winter equals now of spring;
but april's day transcends november's year"

Instead of dictating to other nations how they should emulate us, I suggest that it's long past time that we show those other nations something worth emulating.

(Quoted poetry from ee cummings, "unlove's the heavenless hell and homeless home," 95 Poems (1958).)