If We Harm None

If We Harm None
© Surazeus
2024 12 02

Pared to the essence of what must be said, 
my grandiose speech to persuade the world 
my vision will guide them to paradise 
splinters into riddles and weird proverbs 
that confound the wise and enlighten fools 
with delusions that we are great again. 

Instead of attempting to save the world, 
I drive out to calm mountains of the mind 
to sit by sparkling lake of innocence 
and fish for memories of the good old days 
when truth was truth, bald liars were despised, 
and criminals were not allowed to rule. 

If I hide away in the wilderness, 
tempted by honor to avoid the game 
of power fought between mad greedy thieves, 
I hope the ship of state will right itself 
to avoid hitting the titanic iceberg 
of tyranny that glitters in our way. 

I wonder, as I gaze at sparkling lake, 
if this civil war will be like the last 
when gangs of boys with guns plunder towns, 
and shoot each other for the state of mind 
based on different definitions of freedom, 
till one side randomly defeats the other. 

One side defines freedom as sacred right 
of each person to live free as they will 
to pursue happiness, if we harm none, 
while the other side, driven by blind greed, 
defines freedom as the right to exploit 
working people to accumulate wealth. 

In every crisis our country has faced 
every eighty years for five cycles now, 
forces of democracy, based on right 
of justice and liberty for all, win 
against forces of tyranny that grasp 
to control our bodies and minds as slaves. 

I want to stand in hall of truth and preach 
that justice of fair laws always prevails 
to maintain dignity of working people 
who earn rich wage for labor they expend, 
against aggressive tactics of the rich 
to exploit workers for their private gain. 

This civil war to control rights of people 
to pursue happiness free from despair 
will soon occur no matter what I say, 
so I will curse tyrants who always lose, 
and work for democracy of fair laws 
which will always prevail to nurture growth.