Someone once wrote that originality and insight are like twin lamps fastened above the gate to a walled and fabled city where the lucky ones live; while most of us will labor in the mud and muck of daily life, trying to get closer to the wedge of lemony radiance they shed, open-mouthed at such brightness that holds fast through darkest winter and outshines any lunar or solar glow. What are the odds we'll get there, if the roads are either lashed by flood, overgrown with brambles, barricaded with wire or crusted over with ice? The going is painful and slow; any speed gained is downhill and breakneck— a word dating back to the 1870s, when men trying those novelty penny-farthing bicycles lost their balance, flew through the air and landed face down on the cobblestones. What are the odds anyone teetering on a single giant wheel could look dignified, wielding an instrument designed to dig or move dirt or coal, sand or snow, clad in last year's Halloween costume? Bleat a tune through torches, carry on as if this were the most natural thing in the world. Laugh or cry or point out absurdity and spectacle—but remember, the only difference between the comic and tragic is which side of the gallery erupts in cheers, and which with ridicule.
Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.