Crossposted at DailyKos and ePluribus Media

Now that I've got your attention, bear with me. This is a plea to TPTB as well as a rant, and I invite you to lend your voice to the choir...

The course a nation takes over troubled waters may involve many turns, often forcing the ship of state to navigate the storms and swells of the open sea of international politics or steer clear of shoals and reefs along coasts and inland seas of domestic issues that only fools mistake as portents of safe passage.

Our current course, charted by no "Captains Courageous", is foundering adrift amid a sea of storms, drifting ever closer to the shoals. We have to do something about it, else the spark of mutiny may spring to life and bloom into a raging inferno fanned by the winds of change and the collective air of discontent. In many ways, our online participation is a very effective start in the efforts to adjust our course.

The "ship of state" metaphor is apparently a popular one. Lately, it appears (IMO) to be growing in popularity. It is an apt metaphor for a nation, and the interactions between people foreign as well as domestic. The use of old and new methods of protest, mixing electronic protests with physical marches, have had an impact in a manner never before envisioned. The rise of the netroots was unexpected, potent and powerful. It continues to grow. It is frustrating at times yet reassuring. Along the way, we've all seen a rise in the pitch and timbre of the voices. Folks from all walks of life are participating, lending their voices to the public discourse.

We have encountered biting humor and satire -- long known throughout history as an effective weapon in political battle -- and we've had intellectual brain-food in several forms, from literary to historical and all the ground in between. We've seen the the 101st Fighting Keyboardists on the march, rank and file of the reichwing political pundits, and we've met them in battle.

Where they seek to stifle individual thought and expression, we've revelled in it. Where they've sought to limit educational standards, social welfare and accountability, we've fought against it. Wherever they've sought to sew the seeds of fear and loathing we've met them with words of truth to power. Our metaphors, analogies and meta-Jesuses are based in truth. Our kung-fu (definition #5) is more powerful, particularly when we are focused upon a goal.

While researching some quotes for the next installments of the Danse Macabre series, I came across a poem that conjured up an apt image for our current ship of state. I thought it would be good to share, but I hesitated because of the author.

Longfellow. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

My last attempt to quote -- or even mention -- Longfellow in a dKos diary was insanely unpopular. It dropped like a rock shot out of a cannon. I'm not even sure that the Kossack who'd inspired it, a certain Street Prophet named "teacherken" that you may be familiar with, ever saw it. My diary about how to nail Jell-O to a tree was far better received. But, armed with suggestions from both SusanG and Quaoar and a touch of Tanqueray (w/tonic and lime), I've decided to try again.

Longfellow's poem "The Wreck of the Hesperus" jumped into focus as I clicked through various tabs during my frenzy of research. The poem, about a skipper who'd taken his daughter to sea on his schooner, which was later destroyed in a hurricane in freezing waters, evoked an image our ship of state. The main players that crystalized instantly upon my reading stood readily as metaphors for the comparison. The foolhardy captain would be our own President, played today by the befuddled and misdirected King George George Bush. The daughter portrays our youthful Lady Liberty, in the budding bloom of youth for a nation so young.

It was the schooner Hesperus,

That sailed the wintry sea;

And the skipper had taken his little daughtèr,

To bear him company.

We all know how George likes his photo ops, after all.

In the poem, as with our more stark reality, one of the crew stood up to warn of troubles ahead.

Then up and spake an old Sailòr,

Had sailed to the Spanish Main,

"I pray thee, put into yonder port,

For I fear a hurricane.

In the poem, again as we have seen in our real life observation, the skipper -- we'll just call him "George", after the actor playing the role -- ignored the advice, and continued to steer into the storms. And then the storm hit.

"Come hither! come hither! my little daughtèr,

And do not tremble so;

For I can weather the roughest gale

That ever wind did blow."

The fool and the madman, both embodied in the same persona and ruled by arrogance. I wonder where we have seen that before.

He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat

Against the stinging blast;

He cut a rope from a broken spar,

And bound her to the mast.

Liberty, held hostage to a madman and bound to be dragged along into his folly. He thinks he's provided her protection from the storm by covering her and tying her to the mast. She calls out, telling him of what she hears as the storm ravages the ship, but only afterward realizes that he has died and left her to her fate as the storm raged on.

Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark,

With his face turned to the skies,

The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow

On his fixed and glassy eyes.

Our dear leader promises us such a fate, his faith in his power to weather any storm depending wholly in the crew and the ship that bears them all. The failure of his leadership has brought them to their doom, and the sea in its fury returns them to shore, ultimately striking a reef and sinking the ship...right up to the mast upon which the daughter was tied.

At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,

A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair,

Lashed close to a drifting mast.

Will we end up as the ship in the poem, sunk to the mainsail with Liberty lashed tightly to our mast, frozen and dead due to a mad king's arrogance?

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow!

Christ save us all from a death like this,

On the reef of Norman's Woe!

Let us hope that we are saved from such a fate. I hope and pray that no one may come along in history and have to read of the loss of the nation due to the folly of a man, his administration and the enablers who helped him lead us out into a sea of rage and fury.

There are warning signs on the horizon, and the bells announce the coming of a storm. As they strike out their sonorous tones, I leave you with one more poem. One that many of you understand, and IMO we as the netroots embody:

For whom the bell tolls
a poem (No man is an island) by John Donne.

No man is an island,

Entire of itself.

Each is a piece of the continent,

A part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,

Europe is the less.

As well as if a promontory were.

As well as if a manner of thine own

Or of thine friend's were.

Each man's death diminishes me,

For I am involved in mankind.

Therefore, send not to know

For whom the bell tolls,

It tolls for thee.