Did Theseus have the
thread that ran so true —
about which one
would never rue?
Princess Ariadne gave
him the thread to use
as he traveled the labyrinth,
killed the Minotaur, then flew
back, navigating halls and halls
to travel through.
For Jesse Stuart, teaching was
the “The needle’s eye that does supply,
the thread that runs so true….”
Theseus was the needle’s eye,
the teacher who showed the way
the labyrinthine life through —
so true no student would ever rue.
And so we face our Minotaurs
along life’s labyrinthine way.
We fight the inside and outside wars
and by grace, with the help
of the thread that runs so true
and the needle’s eye
of teachers along the way,
such a life, we will never rue.

One learns legitimate argumentation
in any introductory debate class
and stays away from defamation —
address the issue, cite the facts
never argue ad hominem,
and never, ever go on the attack.
We’ve never seen the occupant’s
transcripts, so we don’t know
and we might look askance
on if he ever took a debate class,
but if the stable genius did
he forgot everything very fast.
One just has to follow his tweets
to see how such an effort
ended in a miserable defeat.

“I want it all
and I want it now,”
is the advertisement’s clarion call —
a cavernous “Christian” country’s maw.
“It’s better to give than to receive.
The one who loses his life will find it.”
It is capitalism’s intent to deceive.
In evangelical America, the real Jesus is a misfit.
He says, “You cannot serve both God and mammon.”
Well then, pack up that Jesus and ship him off via Amazon.

For some unbeknownst reason…
“The day dawned” is a phrase
that keeps popping into his head.
It’s hackneyed and ever so trite.
He might…
just as well have written,
“The dawn of the dead,” instead,
but as trite as it is,
it is…
what happens every day.
He couldn’t very well say,
“The day set,”
when it was dawning
or “The day dawned,”
when it had set.
And so he glanced at the clock
and it was “the noon hour,”
and decided he wouldn’t cower,
but would start the poem
with just such a phrase
and let the readers curse him
with faint praise
for writing a hackneyed phrase.

Sadist Steven wants to send
children to their deaths back
home where they can’t get
the treatment they need here.

Sadist Steven wants to keep
children in cages without basic
hygiene including girls bleed-
ing into their undies.

Sadist Steven continues to
separate children from their
parents at the border and
keep them separated.

Sadist Steven acts like a fascist
and his people suffered in con-
centration camps and were
gassed and burned to ash.

Sadist Steven, seriously, what
went so very wrong for you?

The couple backed the car out
of the driveway, the husband at
the wheel. They were starting
out for the airport where the
woman would meet her mother
and sister for the first leg of a
trip to Greece for a vacation.
The car pulled away. The across
the street neighbor whistled after
the car. It stopped, backed up.
The woman rolled down the win-
dow. He called out, “Say hi to my
good friend Zorba for me. We were
dancing partners back in the day. ”
“Will do.” “Have a great vacation.”
“Thanks.” The neighbor could hear
the anticipatory excitement in her
voice. She waved as her husband
drove down the street on the way
to the great adventure.