"That which you find hateful to yourself,
do not do unto others."

My aunt used to read me Rumplestiltskin
fairy tales make light of ethics
with their cut-out heroes and villains

In the real world war is accountable as pacificism
and terrorists are people that you don't agree with

Those sessions were magical
I thought I knew what the stories meant then
but perhaps I didn't
and that's why
I could savour them over and over

When you read all you have to do is speculate
it's more difficult to act
I like to think I'm on the left
but the left can't keep to its side of the road
that's why it gets run over

We all know that literature can't
right anything
a ladder of words
for the tower of Babel

Meanwhile the world grinds on
taking the poor and illiterate with it.