Template:Strange negotiation

Strange Negotiation

With profound apologies to Wilfred Owen. Honestly, I am really sorry to do this to you.

It seemed that from that conference call I escalated
Some profound dull representation, long since waived
Through credit whose dyspeptic permission granted
Though caveated teeth, a route to our sweet resolve.

Yet also there encumbered assets groaned,
Too fix’d in charge or pledge to be bestirred.
Then, as I probed the liens, one sprang up, and cried
With piteous recharacterisation in his eyes,
Lifting distressèd claims, as if to clarify.
And by his carve-out, I knew that sullen hall,—
Absent limit, all doubt avoided: we stood in Hell.

With a thousand fears that doc-jockey’s face was grained;
Yet, no Representations (to which Part 3(c) applied)
Reached there from where our career aspirations died,
And no covenants thumped, in extent or scope inordinate.
“Strange friend,” I said, “I see no incoming Credit Support.”
“None,” said that other, “save this unperfectèd charge,
The hopelessness. Whatever beneficial interest I hold,
Was my legal title to this asset flawed?
Were’st thou by my tax department’s explanation bored?
Which lies not calm in thought, nor deed, nor tedious phrase,
But mocks the steady drifting of one’s gaze,
Toward the floor — the wall — the sky —
The whole entropic all.
And if I grieve, I grieve for wasted words:
Cast carelessly about, in clumps and hanks of twisted flannel

For by my glee might many men have laughed,
At my double negatives. That ditch, in which I thought I would not lie,
I must now die. I mean the truth untold,
The pity of war, the pity war distilled.
Now men will go content with what we spoiled.
Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress.
None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.
Courage was mine, and I had mystery;
Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery:
To miss the march of this retreating world
Into vain citadels that are not walled.
Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels,
I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.
I would have poured my spirit without stint
But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.

“I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
Let us sleep now. . . .”