Other People Are Not Doing Okay

Darling,

Certain other people are not doing okay.

Take note of their forlorn and miserable gaze--

No, they just do not look or feel okay,

Are not happy or peaceful in any which way.

Forgive me for what I’m about to say,

But the fact is, they look and feel like shit,

And perhaps there’s not much we can do about it--

Perhaps we can’t better their world one whit!

Oh, we could try helping, of course;

We could track all their injuries back to their source;

We could give all our joy just to lift them back up,

Like mad baby Christs with free flowing cups--

And we could do this all night and all bloody day,

Till we ourselves were not doing okay;

Till no sermon, no song, no prayer and no rhyme

Could lift us back up from that contagious slime--

And behold!

They are still not okay!

Look!

They’re still having a terrible, terrible day!

What’s to be done, O what’s to be done,

Dear Sympathy’s child, dear martyred one?

All this caring, all this work,

And still your flock is enmired in hurt!

What a riddle!

What a piddle!

What a fucked up fiddle dee diddle!

And that’s not the worst part,

My sacred, bleeding gentle heart!

For if one of those desperate, wounded sheep

Should ever stir as if waking from sleep,

And turn sweetly toward you and reverently say,

“Hey!

“You have helped me and healed me

And blessed and revealed me--!”

Run, O beloved one;

Run like the fleet-footed rays of the sun,

As fast as you can, till you’re tired, undone;

For there’s nothing more deadly, nothing more dumb,

Nothing more wasteful, than to become

The saviour of one 

Who just isn’t alright,

Or the shepherd of those 

Who are sad and uptight.