A friendly fire by Lyle Thurston | Poemist

Lyle Thurston

Saskatchewan April 18 1995
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A friendly fire

A Friendly Fire

A modest home with embers sitting below a fresh set pyre is the scene where our events transpire. There they burn but are not a fire. Though the right mix of wood and air is all that they require.For wood and air and heat conspire. When together they consume entire.

At a table two men sit in that low hue one of forty three and one of thirty two. Whiskey bottles and a can of chew sets the atmosphere I transcribe to you. Of malice you would find no clue for they wore happy masks while their irritation grew. A friendly discussion within this place fans the flames of unbridled hate.

Freedom, peace and an independent mind is my values entirely defined. You talk of slavey, war and indoctrination with intellectual names beyond your station. Who are you to question a nation a labourer with a poor mans education. Surely you haven’t the faculty of interpretation to understand these ideals which you give such adulation. That is why I disagree spoke the man of forty three.

The embers just then caught anew light flame in the hearth flew. Radiant light added an ominous glow though little heat did it through. Feeble flames danced and withdrew across the wooden surface it slowly chew. The sense of comfort that a flame may bring isn’t true for all things does fire undo.

You contradict yourself by way of your own existence. Dogma, ignorance and persistence are the shield and spear of your resistance. You fancy a world of non-existence the bourgeois will not allow our admittance. Between you and I there is little distance. I hope for change is our only difference. As you say my collar is blue but look down you wear it too. Blind and immovable still are you laughed the man of thirty two.

Flaming fingers reach from below and boiling sap from within overflow. The fireplace is now aglow on the pair a steady heat it does bestow. Harsh is the sizzle and grey the smoke up the chimney it flows. Devilish shadows spring to and fro their evil faces begin to show.

Death and destruction these ideas have sewn for the future painted in your tone. Political crime and mindless drones bondage is all that we would own. Cities built on piled bone you see it not but you stand alone. How could you possibly wish for the unknown. The force before you will not be overthrown. On this subject we cannot agree barked the man of forty three.

Writhing wriggling tentacles of flame grasped inside it’s stony frame. Engulfing all is it’s aim what is touched will be maimed. The roaring demon can not be tamed everything it will eventually claim.The mask has fallen and it’s face lay plain the monster no longer hides in shame.

Look around yourself sir have you not described our current situation. Shameless politicians and tax inflation. We march to work for ungrateful corporations. This we do for mere sustentation. Drones that don’t work are cast aside put in prison and chastised. Intolerable reactionist best defines you spat the man of thirty two.

Their table shook from a heavy fist and a pistol came up from under it. The man of forty three with pistol aimed in the grip of fury that could not be tamed. The man of thirty two still seated exclaimed. Look at this crying shame. An unarmed man to be damned by the judgement of a friendly hand. Tell me would you. What have I done that forced you to draw your gun. Was it my freedom of hypocrisy and that I spoke my mined or the scare you got when I removed your blind.Perhaps my independent form of thought caused your mob brain to start to rot. I stand against your hijacked terms which your ideal has not earned. A mass produced infernal fool with foot in mouth you have lost the duel. These were final words and turn of screw from the man of thirty two.

A shot rang out in the night air and made only one of this once friendly pair. Where do you lay the blame for both parties were clearly insane? The man who killed when he could have spared or the one who came unprepared. For the man who’s heart was stilled should have known revolution is kill or be killed.
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