Postcards from the Edge.....

Amidst the whirling fervor of the coming mas the blood of a people is being thrown far and wide. Thirty Seven dead in thirty four days, among them a six year old boy on whom licks was having no effect despite the bruises dug into his skin so more than licks was sent for. No, this little deviant needed a harder lesson, to be flung out of the window into the oblivion and fall to earth in awe of the animal anger that could do such a thing to a small child, similar in scope if not to the depravity required to drag another small child into a dirty school washroom, stick his head in an even dirtier toilet bowl and to flush it for good measure. Flush it to make a point, to send a message, humble and humiliate at one time, and bring everything and everyone back into the order according to brute force. Those with authority to prevent such things from happening or to respond when they do seem incapable of understanding their role and their responsibility, so they too play a mas, point this way and that, blame this one and that and pose. We will deliver, we will surrender, fight to the end and give them no quarter. These words sound hollow because we know they're not true, yet we nod along and walk along because it is all we could do.

We hustle by impatiently interrupted by the white clad workers of the mortician's office removing the body and washing down the body fluids, causing a back up, a snail's pace and discomfort to those who wonder why this couldn't be done at night? A former beauty queen in the wrong place at the wrong time finds herself facedown in her blood, jaw broken and fighting for life as the anger that could both contemplate and deliver such hate moves on. The protective services find themselves overwhelmed by a wave of madness even while they themselves are under attack from their lowest rank to their highest officer. To the uninitiated looking on the country should not be able to claim to be civilized after this, but the discussion has to wait until the mas done. Back to the wall when guns bark, look left, look right and move. We are learning to dance the macabre dance, hustling to find we self jam pack in a corner to play a mas selector.

How can this little country take much more? How is it possible that a nation can consider itself governed yet not trust its own leadership? How can a Prime Minister announce a threat to assassinate both her as well as members of her Cabinet and no one believe her yet still remain Prime Minister? How could the forces of the State arrest this one and that one with no evidence to charge yet bad mind enough to distress using state sponsored strong arm tactics and not expect those advantaged to look to apply advantage when their turn rolls around?

Advantage has become a national pastime, and women lucky enough to make it home and safe find themselves in danger with a rapist hiding behind the eyes of someone they already know, someone who's supposed to care. The name of the game is to take what you want, and don't take no for an answer. We are breeding fatherless children into a motherless world and trusting that they will survive. The ranks of the wrong are swelling to a critical mass where soon it will be hard to tell the purpose of our laws or the reasons for our institutions any longer and no one is trying to answer the question, why is this happening? The clock of our good fortune is slowly ticking away as the seething anger is coming to a slow and steady boil. The people who can move already have passport in hand stamped and ready to go. The rest will be left to jam, play a mas and hope for the best. Amidst the ping-ping, tinging of the sweet sweet tenor pan a nation is dying, but we're doing it in style to a killer back beat made in China. Like yuhself...