Unlikely 2.0


   Whenever you find you are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect. —Mark Twain


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The End of Unlikely 2.0

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Two Poems by Jonathan Penton

Poem Written Inside a McDonald's Within a Wal-Mart

"I had to pull off the road," he told me. "I was so excited, so happy. All at once, I realized that eventually, everyone I hated was going to die."

And i thought that our love would live forever
     so i write a poem to wish it good-bye
          and this paper will crumble, the words forgotten
               the hard drive deleted, the Internet obsoleted
                    the electrons rendered inert

The institutions that bring you such power, such terror
won't be a footnote in an unremembered text
While the gods of your forefathers remain immortal as long as your fantasies stay naif
                                                                                     ah, but you were never a naif


still i believe you are holy
     that the holy and the unholy die
          that nothing that dies is unholy

and i believe you have power
     to reach everything that's long since gone
          to embrace what will happen tomorrow

and if these beliefs leave me grasping
     for fantasies my mind will reject
          i'll treat this wal-mart as something greater than myself
               and pretend human failures can have historical context




Pale of Calais

If parts of our love are true
we are still both liars
as was every charming prince who sullied our dark names
and if Beauty is something real
we will still die ugly
finally forgetting our glory and our shame

So let us not pretend that mortal love is Holy
or that this blessing of our union makes it perfect
and let us not retreat into the fantasies we share
lest close attention reveal them as the little things they are

Darling, we have learned
of the wars within and without us
we know that victory is something none can justly claim
So let us learn to make love with the darkling plain;
It's the only love we have left



Jonathan Penton forged UnlikelyStories.org in the fires of Mount Doom, and into it poured his hatred, cruelty, and will to dominate. You can read some more deliberate misdirection at his bio page, or something barely more authentic at Jonathan.UnlikelyStories.org.


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