Purina Hall Of Fame

Sleeping masters roused to burning homes from beds Steeping toddlers plucked from their watery deaths Ribbons, plaques and soft-soap are the ephemeral rewards Paid to the slaves whose selfless acts accord A higher value to their masters These parting gifts, bolt pistols Console the rest, the remainder Too bad the tribute's paid to lives that relegate these thrones To lives spent valuing the runners-up, are known Are to be neither fleeting nor desirable, but nothing surprises me these days I just sit and watch the boxcars roll by and wait Patient Unattended So patient So unattended A package under A terminal bench and A short fuse to scatter Steady hands if I forget to remember That better lives have Been lived in The margins and Locked in the prisons And lost on the gallows Than have ever been enshrined in palaces It's not your fault There's nothing you can do It's just the way it is There's nothing we can do