WEP Challenge February 2022: An Underrated Quality

  

Image by John Hain from Pixabay

When they say that all you need is love

Most people’s heads fill with starry-eyed visions

Of pretty young folk romancing one another

Or maybe a bit of bromance between virile young men

Or innocent sisters skipping hand in hand through fields of flowers

Such ideas are little more than cotton candy in a world that is starving

Until you can find it in your heart to have compassion

For those you have deemed ugly and unworthy

The disabled, the elderly, and those who aren’t pretty in a certain delicate way

The mentally ill, the homeless, the deformed

Victims who hide away too traumatized to face the world

Until services are provided for each and every one

We do not have the right to say that we know how to love

In any case, the word love has too many connotations

Of gaiety and frippery

Of lads and lasses tripping the light fantastic into one another’s arms

Then riding off into the sunset to live happily ever after

What the world needs far more than sweet young romance

Is compassion in its muted shades of black and white and gray

Compassion doesn’t care if someone is pretty

It doesn’t care if they are young or old

If they are full of vitality or on their deathbed

If they are black or white or brown or red

If they are fat or thin or in between

Whether they are a real go-getter or a real nowhere nobody

If they are able-bodied or disabled in whatever manner

Compassion seeks to serve them all

A world that lacks compassion cannot claim to be a loving world

A society that lacks compassion cannot claim to be successful

A soul lacking in compassion has no love to give

Until there is fairness and justness in the treatment of all people

This is a world without love

So it is my position that rather than seeking romance

Instead of longing to drown in an ocean of desire

What we really need to create a better life

Is to feed the hungry

To house the homeless

To comfort the suffering

To respect the soul within

Rather than objectify or criticize the body without

What we need is empathy to create a better society

Then maybe we can talk about love

That flighty fairy with fragile gossamer wings

~ornery owl~

390 words

Image by plukdedag64 from Pixabay

Blurbish Thing:

It's a poem addressing the fact that when people hear the word "love" they usually think of romantic love. I feel that women, in particular, are conditioned to focus on romantic love above their own goals and happiness. As well, I don't feel that romantic love will have much impact on the mess the world is in. What we need is empathy. 

If this blurb is too long and convoluted, feel free to just use the first sentence.

I really have no desire for a full-blown poetry critique. You like it or you don't. If you like it, my name is Ornery Owl and you should tell the world about the great poetry you read on my blog. If you don't like it, my name is Vinny Viper and I suggest that you don't talk to anyone about that putz Ornery Owl.

http://writeeditpublishnow.blogspot.com

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