PATRIOTISM
The Citizen who Dearly Loves
his Country and his Town may lose
the thread of what prevents the shoves
that are life's ultimate bad news.
That Citizen's rich ardor soon
may formulate some mighty wish
to see a home assume a tune
that could quite shatter any dish.
The Flags then may begin a Dance
that fosters Blindness of a size
that happily would form a trance
that gouges everybody's eyes.
A Patriot's Great Dignity
can take a world and give it help
but build the Perfect Misery
whose every silence is a Yelp.
The perfect love may be such mere
persistence as creates no waves
whose briskness could produce a cheer
as raucous as a Breeze that Raves.