Some folks like to call history a dead letter.   I really don’t understand this.

Dead Letter
by Michael Romani

The past is never a dead letter
But something we should study together
Every generation rewrites the past
And from it we learn new directions cast

There's a need for the continuity
That dashes off all incongruities
Teaching us what we share in generations
Rather the bad or things of veneration

Loosening up thinking that must be done
For all of our future battles to be won
A lifeline that gets us past the now
Looking both back and yet forward somehow

All times are scary and hold danger
To this no generation is a stranger
We must draw from this bank of knowledge
Particularly when we feel our feet on the ledge

Less a science than a collection of stories
History's lessons are troubles and all the glories
This brings the sustainability on which we live
As we hopefully are taking less than we offer and give

Moments we share as we carry on quietly
In acts of heroism had almost silently
Until the extraordinary erupts into the ordinary
Proving to each of us what we can be

(c) March 21, 2020  Michael Doyle
All Rights Reserved