If religion and politics are basically control tools, I have a suggestion. Don't play.
Do any of those jokers in government or in the pulpit ever look like they're having a good time? No, of course not. Take a look at a kid in a mud puddle. Watch a cat with a box.
Whistle a tune and you're a songwriter. Paint animals and sunsets on your shoes and you're an artist, a fashion designer.
Get your mind into the gutter and keep it there. Love like your life depends on it.
Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.
As always, some things are better, some things are worse. Do you suppose we're near some end, or do you see a Golden Age on the horizon?
Today's villains are world class. I suppose we have Marvel comics to thank. That, politics and religion.
Heroes seem scarce. Maybe I just don't know where to look anymore. Bruce and Lucinda are still at it, more fiercely than ever. Jesse Welles is here. There are some old school journalists sub-stacking here and there. A young reporter couldn't find a job.
Don't give up. Peace and love have been down before.
As I watch the news from across an ocean, I struggle to keep even a flaccid upper lip. The struggle for attention and power and revenge dominates most all of any media coverage. Folks who wanted to be famous but had no talent and men who craved wealth but weren't born to it battle cruel people with no empathy and bad guys who were bullied or abused, by parents or schoolmates, for attention and revenge.
Here I sit in a little corner of paradise, cut off from the everyday kerfuffle, and try to make sense of it. Of course there is no sense to be made of it.
If one of the madmen drops the big one, then I disappear like everyone and everything else. Short of that, I have to file the sad state of human affairs along with the other sad factors of life.
Love is the only alternative. It's easy. Its value is incalculable and its cost is free.
The deck is stacked, dear friends. It's their dice. I salute the brave combatants who keep the struggle alive and I would love, more than anything, to be proven wrong. Looks to me like cheaters win.
Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.
On a day like this I feel like the oldest dog in the pound who just got taken home to live like a king for his remaining days. As Kurt would say, "If this isn't nice, what is?"
I am finally learning to tune out the static from the news. Oh, I'm still outraged and my heart is broken on a regular basis. I care as much as ever. Anguish that I'm unable to convert to action, however, won't change the world.
Did I come along at the right time- you know, Elvis, hot rods, peace & love- or do I just romanticise the life I've lived?
Who cares? I've sung my songs to the sweetest folks in the world.
The last things in the world that I want to fight about are religion and politics. Really, I would rather not fight at all, with anyone, about anything. I'm probably a little better at avoiding conflict than I was as a young man. Not much.
There are patterns that became obvious to me that endure as I watch the world spin. First and foremost, there are good guys and bad guys.
Don't tell me if your candidate is a Republican or a Democrat; is he a good guy or a bad guy?
I'm less interested in the color of your immigrant than I am in his plans for the future. I'm not that interested in the deity that he prays to unless he is looking to blow up some of the others because of a message from that god.
Yep, good guys and bad guys. Wrestlers, cowboys, politicians, bankers, soldiers, preachers and whatever else you've got.
History is written by the victors. This new batch, if there are books in our future, should be fascinating. If I'm around, I'll rush to look up slavery, fascism, living wage, climate change...
Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.
Don't run out of dreams before you run out of steam. Life, for me, has gotten better in fits and starts since I was a kid. There are days when I think maybe I had better use up some of this love and luck, just to keep from having it go to waste at the end.
My will is pure poetry, boys.
Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.
