gladiators

This is a forum for readers. Authors walk these halls at their own risk. I__e been to the Coliseum in Rome. GR is just that. Books are gladiators. Readers are ravenous citizens awaiting their next bite of entertainment, all Caesars with thumbs readied for judgement. Even champions fall prey to sword now and then. And you know what they say about the pen and the sword_the analogy is a bit muddled, but it__ in there somewhere.

BLOODY LIPSThe bloody woundOf the gladiatorGurgles out life's end.The cries of acclimations from the standsFill the sky with raging tigers.Waving their arms about to incite the massesThe aging notables add an air of dignity to the arena.Making their separate entriestheyKNEELover the still-warm corpsesOf the young. Their withered lips they poseUpon the fresh flowing woundsAnd, to prolong their lives _ so they believe,Suck, ravenously suck out the blood, blood, blood.Fresh blood from the sunFlowing into filthy veinsAs into sewage pipes,And thus the Heart of the Nation is abandoned.