Mr. Fred's Poetry Corner, Part 2: The Comment

This morning I was thinking about comments on blogs, and well, it got me thinking:

For generosity of spirit
I’m not known,
But somewhere in my deepest heart
There is a note that can respond
To gentle prodding,
From a respected source,
It takes me by surprise,
And shames me, I’ll admit,
Like this morning,
Idly going through the days news and blogs,
I came across a quote
From the widely respected Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
Which suggested that,
If we’d only look,
Into the real situation of,
And the history of our enemy,
The better to understand him or her,
It would be easy thereby
To almost instantly find,
Plenty of facts that in their knowing
Would cause our enmity to fall away,
Like someone who had jumped out of a plane.
Well, I tried it,
And was briefly convinced,
That upon reflection, and with an open heart,
My enemy’s life had certainly been hard,
And the reasons for his generally, casually bad behavior
Were evident to anyone who cared to consider
Where he, in effect, was coming from,
And I thereupon resolved,
After years of cursing the air that he or she breaths
To find, if there is a god, a fatal disease microbe
And deliver it into the lungs of this person,
And cursing the food that he or she eats,
To please, with the will of god, certain to be offered
If he or she knew this person,
Nourish within yourself,
A disagreeable, and, yes, fatal bacterium,
But now, filled with the spirit of fraternity and love,
I resolved to go to the blog of this person,
Of which he or she is inordinately proud,
And quite insufferably pleased with himself or herself,
Which he or she seems to believe
Is the crowning effort, in a lifetime of desperate struggles,
Struggles to get people to agree
That he or she is the biggest hipster of them all,
Struggles that had previously born no fruit, or dead fruit,
I went to the blog,
With the best of intentions, I assure you,
To understand is to vanquish fear and anger
(Said the great man)
I went to the blog and I read a little,
Looking for a suitable place to leave a favorable comment,
And maybe a small, humble, long overdue greeting,
In good cheer,
But I read a little,
And then a little more,
And before long my cheeks grew red,
And my anger rose,
This person is the most condescending little shit imaginable,
So pleased with himself or herself,
So quick to judge others,
So sure that he or she is the god-appointed arbiter
Of all that is hip, or has ever been cool,
Don’t get me wrong,
I don’t have that talent either,
But neither do I profess to,
This unimaginably patronizing person,
Will surely go to hell, and soon too,
The human experience being what it is,
And my advice to Lucifer
Is to immediately block him or her up behind a wall,
Before he or she can contaminate perdition,
The way that he or she has,
For so long now,
Contaminated our own world of beauty,
And, out of the kindness of my heart,
In a spirit of fraternity and love,
I left no comment at all!


April 20, 2008, in a breath (No, it's not David)