Ficlets

A Rant Sans Audience

“Turning and turning in a widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer; / Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,” Quoted the young man in dark polo and jeans. “We live in a time,” he continued in his own words, “of superstition and ignorance. We live in a time of hope.”

The audience, uncaring coffee shop patrons in the main, mostly ignored the young man’s speech and sipped their coffees. They were used to fiery ideologues and the attraction of the faddishly nouveau-coffee was far more absorbing.

“You all misunderstand my words.” Projected the young man as he warmed to his subject. “You seem to think that I’m advocating, ” his tone turned bitter and biting for a moment, “Hope as some sort of anodyne to our problems! Far be it!”

He sipped his own custom made coffee then, his slightly novel assertion distracting some of the drinkers. “Hope is the source of our problems. We think that if we wish for something, it somehow becomes real! Fie on that, say I!”

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