On Pros and Cons - A Poessay

Life is full of pros and cons. And they both lead us down the garden path to execution. Execution is not only cessation of breathing by any means. It is also the state of befuddlement. – of acceptance of status quo – of surrender to bullying.

Aspiring President George Dubya Bush is both a pro and a professional. Real President Dick Cheney is a pro’s pro.

The ongoing primaries select the presidential candidates for the forthcoming presidential elections. Our primaries were in the earliest part of our schooling.

The house James Hoban designed in 1792 had gray stone walls. The British troops turned it into smoked gray in 1814. The citizenry pushed them back and painted the walls white.

The primaries are a ginger step to occupy this white house.

But Abu Daulat, a euphemism for Almighty Greenback says it does not matter whether a republican or a democrat occupies the white house. The occupant is a puppet of AG.

This makes the president a pro.

Heidi Fleiss agrees. We don’t know how Umrao Jaan Ada would react to this. She was both a professional and a pro and her input would have been valuable.

There is a barely discernible fault line between a professional and a pro but this fault line gets the neon treatment when crossed – then a pro turns into a con.

Spiro Agnew started off as a professional, then graduated as a pro and retired as a con. The jury is out on his boss Richard Milhous. Did he turn con? Was he a con?

Supreme Court judges are professionals selected from amongst the lawyers who are also professionals. And there are pros amongst both. Very few have turned cons. But when do nations of the world suffer.

A digression is a must. A married housewife is a professional if you believe the feminists. She is a pro in the kitchen – and the living and bed rooms. She does things for which she does not get paid.

The ones that get paid are called pros. They move horizontally from ceiling to ceiling.

Life is full of pros and cons we said earlier. An aspiring writer friend, at an early stage, did not like to wait upon the tables. Instead she walked the corner of Carlton and Jarvis to sustain her passion. Once when we were discussing the pros and cons of life she looked us in the eyes and mused if a word-gigolo was a professional or a pro. We looked away.

This is perhaps the first of a new genre. It is a combination of an essay and a poem. Since I am not easily discouraged by the tremendous feed backs on poems here it is safe to assume that your generous feedback will only have the intended firming up of my resolve.

(first published Fe05/2008)