ODE TO THE SWIRLING MAELSTROM.

By Peter M. DeLorenzo

Detroit. (Editor’s Note: Now for something completely different on this Valentine’s Day - Peter’s ode to the business, warts and all. –WG)

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

The troubled postures and the tortured souls;

The unrelenting grind that consumes and rejects;

A haven for the spineless and scoundrel alike;

Yet a stage for the best and the brilliant too.

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

But why do you torture us?

Why is solace such a fleeting afterthought?

Why must you burden us with charlatans and carpetbaggers?

Why must it always be swirling? Is it ever not?

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

But alas our lot is to churn and burn;

And to chase Silicon Basement Boys promising The Next;

And it makes us all quiver and quake,

Fearing that One Big Mistake.

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

But why the headlong rush to oblivion?

Why must freedom of mobility mean the end of The Dream?

Why is it easier to throw money at the impossible?

Than it is to grind out the possible?

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

Why must it be a “pride-swallowing siege”?

Why must we battle and claw for what’s right?

Only to watch as the minions get it all wrong?

Have you no mercy? Have you no shame?

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

You taunt us with euphoria.

You grant us glimpses of a Cobalt Blue Sky.

You allow us to scale the mountaintop,

Only to snatch it away with cruel, icy aplomb.

Oh Swirling Maelstrom, How I Love Thee So.

Yet you test us. You pound us. You hate us.

You dole out the fleeting moments, and deem it to be enough.

But then again you are wise beyond all of our years;

Because we love every minute of it, relentlessly clamoring for more.

And that’s the High-Octane Truth for this week.