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Tarot Poetry
by Michael Gerald Sheehan

The School Of Staying Alive

The cowboy and the spaceman
Need to get along these days,
Learn to give each other room
To live in their own ways,
To believe in the way they see things,
To behave as they believe
And to have their yarn respected
In the tapestry we weave.
There are many kinds of creatures
With an instinct to survive:
Every one is a natural teacher
In the school of staying alive.

His trouble with the red man
Goes back a long, long way,
But the natives made him welcome
When the cowboy came to stay -
Didn't send him an invitation,
Didn't know he would stay so long,
Didn't think his fallen angels
Would try to teach them right from wrong.
From the first they believed in sharing
With any man who could survive:
Every one is a natural teacher
In the school of staying alive.

The native is the father,
The cowboy is the son,
The spaceman is the holy ghost
And yet these three are one
In the eyes of an untouched virgin,
In the heart of the Magdalene,
In the hands of the lesbian witches
We betrayed and called unclean
And to every kind of creature
With an instinct to survive:
Every one is a natural teacher
In the school of staying alive.

XI - Justice

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Indecision can result when the head is disconnected from the heart. Bad decisions can result when the head is fooled by appearances and false representations. Guilt and regret can result when we second-guess the decisions in our past. The lesson of Justice is to weigh matters in the heart until we feel a centeredness, then know, without regrets, that we are making the best decision we can.

The civil war is over,
But the north and south still fight
To justify by any means
The cause they thought was right,
But the fighting itself is evil,
The slaves couldn't stay in chains
And the children live on a battlefield
While their parents fight remains.
They're a different kind of creature
With an instinct to survive:
Every one is a natural teacher
In the school of staying alive.

We fought a revolution
So that all men could be free,
Framed the constitution
To protect our liberty -
But the bribers in the lobby
And the traitors on the throne

Stole a trillion dollars
While our backs were turned
And left our kids to pay the loan.
All we saw were their fingers pointing
At the homeless and the poor,
At the blacks and abortion mothers
Who couldn't make ends meet no more
And at all the battered children
Using drugs to numb their pain
So we re-elect the criminals
While their victims take the blame.
Now the world's been filled with poisons,
The ozone's fading away
And the final test in survival school
Is our vote on judgement day.
If we fight for our rights together,
Something tells me we'll survive:
Everyone is a natural teacher
In the school of staying alive

Keyword: Balance

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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