Eternity Beyond
As resources diminish yet none will curtail their use,
It’s each man for himself as frantic grows the restless crowd,
As restlessness competitive leads men into abuse,
Nor in the situation any crudeness disallowed.
If bonds of mutual respect and common understanding
Got set in place before the crisis struck and overwhelmed
There were some recourse, diligence and honesty commanding,
Yet each man by himself can hardly be by prospects calmed.
Upon the left, upon the right sits evidence aplenty
That none will help each occupied with his unique distress,
As Good Samaritans account for less than one in twenty,
And by some calculations drastically extremely less.
Those as accustomed to “cash flow” when all the flowing stops
May know it’s economics though they blame themselves at first,
And soon it’s caging contraband and fleeing from the cops,
While murder for a method grows increasingly dispersed.
When one was schooled in virtue no they didn’t teach one that
All’s well for common courtesy but when push turns to shove
One’s lean starvation notes another’s little bit of fat,
At which time one is justified to doubt fraternal love.
Curtailment of excesses come externally applied,
While consequences turn the neighborhood into a zone
As fraught with violation, not so many shows of pride,
Nor what one has he wants his competition to have known.
Alas for human virtue! If one only understood
That by no other means is formed the common human bond,
Which when it disappears transforms the tenor of the ’hood,
Though it be Lower East Side or eternity beyond.