VOCABULARY

        Abash, Abate, abet, abstemious . . .
        And so began our first-form vocab list,
        Which made us all awhile put up a fuss
        That Mr. Harlow cruelly would insist
        Upon our learning ten new words a week
        While still remembering all of those before—
        Prompting us to rebel in such a pique*
        We took our case to the headmaster’s door.
        Somehow he mollified our wrath, and we
        Complied with that outrageous regimen,
        Not knowing yet its profitability
        For all occasions when we’d wield a pen:
             The SAT was not the least of these,
             Plus all our essays earning A’s and B’s.


        *(No doubt a word we'd learned one wordlist week) 

*

READINESS

   The readiness is all, the ripeness, too:
   Two rules for life and art that Shakespeare knew,
   Which mean that Genius works in its own time
   According to its destined paradigm,
   Nor will it be presumptuously coerced,
   Though in due time its treasures are disbursed.
   Meanwhile we seek such wholesome nourishment
   And exercise as further our intent
   To bring our hidden latencies to birth
   Made manifest for all to see their worth.

*

PAX VOBISCUM

    Where does aggression come from but from fear?
    We are afraid of losing something dear
    And thus defend ourselves from all assault,
    Yet in so doing, we commit a fault,
    Since violence is never justified
    Unless all peaceful means have first been tried
    To gain those ends to which we have a right
    With all care taken to avoid a fight.

    The way to peace is generosity,
    The opposite of animosity;
    It’s learning to be kind to all our kind,
    Our motives being harmoniously aligned
    Because we hold no principle above
    Each one’s innate entitlement to love.

*

MUGGLEDOR

       Erastus Theophrastus Muggledor
       One day announced himself at my front door
       Unbidden and unknown and on a mission
       For a faith I took as just a superstition:

       He said that we’re not made for enmity.
       But, rather, we’re hardwired for empathy;
       Though malefactors practice double-dealing,
       Still most of us are moved by fellow feeling
       And do to others as we’d have them do
       Compassionately, while standing in our shoe.

       “But I thought Darwin said, ‘It’s tooth and claw’”
       I said.  He said, “He later fixed that flaw
       And recognized survival all depends
       Not on our enemies, but on our friends.

*

THE EMPATHIC CIVILIZATION

for Jeremy Riflin

     Though “dog eat dog” was once the final word
     when Survival of the Fittest ruled the day
     and scientists to Darwin all deferred,
     we reckon now another, happier way.

     We find in primates signs of empathy,
     that selfishness is not the only rule
     by which the higher orders live—we see
     we can be kindly, though we’re often cruel.

     The way ahead in this most perilous time
     is to progress empathically and learn
     the arts and manners of a paradigm
     that guarantees we’ll neither freeze nor burn.

          For fire and ice lie in our forecast now,
          which only empathy can disallow.

*

DETECTIVE STORY

        “Once upon a time” the story starts
        then takes us on the journey of its plot
        engaging, at the best, both minds and hearts,
        discerning what is true from what is not.
        Because the tale’s a mystery, we must
        keep all our wits about us as we read,
        while wondering if we can always trust
        the narrator or clues that might mislead.
        A sudden turn of fresh events may throw
        us off the track, beginning a new course
        of episodes, adding another foe,
        yet all the while we close in on the source
        of all the mayhem, ever held in thrall
        until Sherlock at last discloses all.

*

BARDOLATRY III

   Shakespeare lives on today in Prospero,
   His crafty, artful, supernatural mage
   Who conjures tempests on the wooden O
   Of our Bard’s global microcosmic stage.

   That we might think those players in their passion
   (Reciting their poetic dialogue,
   Strangely composed in antiquated fashion)
   Would raise in us no more than a mental fog

   Is contradicted by experience:
   Like Prospero’s, the visions of the Bard
   Beguile and captivate our every sense,
   While softening each heart, however hard.

        Devised by cosmological design,
        His plays disclose their maker as divine.

*