Cultural Heroes in Difficult Times

Cultural Heroes in Difficult Times

Thank you to those who told me that they missed my columns during the last few months. [Summer, 2012, ed.] We were getting into the last convulsions of some very bitter political campaigns. I felt strongly tempted to respond to the upwelling of political partisanship by fighting a battle of ideas in print. Lord, some of those letters to the editor got me steamed. Instead, I put a bumper sticker on my car that said: “You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts.”

I almost got sucked into arguing with the undoubting faithful from the other side. That has variously been compared to “confronting a shadow in a knife fight,” “grabbing the ears of an angry dog” and “throwing pearls before swine.” Nothing good can come of it.

On the other hand, I believe we should persistently doubt our own assumptions, opinions and preconceived notions. It’s like I used to tell my boys, “It’s okay to talk to yourself and it’s even okay to argue with yourself, but when you start to lose those arguments, it’s time to start asking new questions.”

What is it That You Fear?

"Always care enough to resist. Set your heart strong to insist, that goodness must persist. Resist, I say. Light the way. Every day." David Satterlee

Poem: Gathering Courage

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Gathering Courage

Life Will Get You in the End:
Short Stories by David Satterlee

from the book: Life Will Get You in the End:
Short stories by David Satterlee

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A decent proposal. A young man ponders the anxiety he may feel when it comes time to, someday, pop the question.

Gathering Courage

Standing on the corner,

Passing time away,

I think of all the times we’ll meet

And all the things we’ll say.

I think of sitting close to you

And watching the moon rise.

We’ll let the world just pass us by

What fools could be more wise?

I’ll hold you close and speak your name

Until we rise and all can see

That what they once had thought was one

Was really you and me.

I’ll care for you and make you mine

And we will vow our need.

Will share a love that only gives

And never takes in greed.

I think of what I need to live—

How I’d give all that I claim

To have you for my own to love

And have you share my name.

                             February 28, 1972