Hearts

This poem is dedicated to a friend who has recently had their heart broken.

Hearts are chunks of perfect beauty we all carry within us. These little sparks are proof positive of a blissful joy beyond understanding. So powerful it trancends our earthly senses and points to a metaphyscial reality that rings true in our souls. Though unseen, we do catch glimpeses of it's effects in our lives.

Like a new born baby, young hearts have a pure glow to them you can actually smell. They exude syrupyness without leaving that sickly sweet sting on your tongue. A naive innocence so absolute we pass laws to make destroying such a wonderous thing the most heinous crime.

But hearts are made to be broken. Like any good thing they must come to an end. Fixing a broken heart is a dirty job to be sure. It can seem impossibly daunting when you see the countless twisted shards strewn across the floor like shrapnel. Your hands are sure to get bloody with the sharp edges of raw emotions cutting into your fingers. You'll suffer setbacks of missing pieces. Even when you finally finish the puzzle and the pieces back together you'll see veins running through a once clear and seamless surface like cancerous fingers gripping your heart and refusing to let go.

Here is the part where so many of us go wrong. In the name of safety and a misled effort to avoid the same tragedy again we lock our heart away in a dungeon. Caged up like a criminal, as if to say it was at fault. Too open, too accepting, too trusting. Instead what we should do is cast open the doors and let the light shine through us.

Sure it won't shine the same. But that simple shimmer is replaced by a full spectrum of hues and brightness. Those white veins turn into twisiting pillars of light. Tiny inflections in them make the light dance in new and wonderous ways.

Hearts are made to be broken.

Oh No Canada!

In the throne speech of March 3rd, 2010 the government said "Our Government will also ask Parliament to examine the original gender-neutral English wording of the national anthem."

I'm sorry. What? Yes folks, apparently our National Anthem is sexist by using the phrase "in all thy sons command." Is this really a priority? Even for extremist femenists, they must have more pressing issues at hand? Like maybe, equal pay for women doing the same job as a man? No, we need to bastardize our National Anthem first!

To me, it's an Old English word similar to the other ones used in the song that can in essence mean "sons & daughters". Or perhaps, it's because the song was written at the turn of the previous century when it was our sons we commanded into battle. But the government claims that the original version was gender neutral ("thou dost in us command").

To me it looks like the government didn't read their own website. O Canada was originally written and composed in French, and subsequently translated into English, with entirely different lyrics aside from the title. Numerous variations of translations followed. Our current national anthem is based upon a poem by the Honourable Robert Stanley Weir. The poem had 4 main stanzas (or verses) and a refrain. It's the 1st main stanza upon which our national anthem was built

O Canada! Our home and native land!
True patriot love thou dost in us command.
We see thee rising fair, dear land,
The True North, strong and free;
And stand on guard, O Canada,
We stand on guard for thee.

But if we are going to revisit the lyrics we should look at ALL of them. The first thing we'll have to get rid of is the line about "native land" seeing as we stole most of it from them. Next would be the line about God. Because if our children can't talk to God in schools (public prayer) then we shouldn't talk about God. And calling ourselves the "True North" might offend other Northern nations like Russia & the Netherlands. And speaking of freedom would be unfair and innacurate when refering to prisoners. Finally, we need to modernize the language. Lose the 'thee''s and 'thou''s for something like "Yo Canada."

We'll be left with nothing but glowing hearts guarding nothing but our political correctness, and perhaps hockey. Whichs make me wonder, aside from hockey games, when do most Canadians attempt to even hum along (since we long ago forgot the words when they made it 1/2 in french or we finished high school)? At this point I think most Canadians are more familiar with the Hockey Night In Canada theme song. Of course, they screwed with that too.

Which is just more proof that if it ain't broke don't fix it.