Dear Coach's Corner - Propagandhi

Dear Ron MacLean

Dear Coach’s Corner

I’m writing in order

For someone to explain

To my niece the distinction

Between these mandatory pre-game group rites of submission

And the rallies at Nuremberg

Specifically the function

The ritual serves in conjunction

With what everybody knows

Is in the end a kid’s game

I’m just appealing to your sense of fair play

When I say she’s puzzled by

This incessant pressure for her to not defy

Collective will yellow-ribboned lapels

As the soldiers inexplicably rappel

Down from the arena rafters

If it not so insane

They’ll be grounds for screaming laughter

Dear Ron MacLean

I wouldn’t bother with these questions

If I didn’t sense some spiritual connection

We may not be the same

But it’s not like we’re from different planets

We both love this game so much we can hardly fucking stand it

Alberta-born and Prairie-raised

Ain’t a sheet of ice north of Fargo I ain’t played

Penhold to the Gatineau

Every fond memory of childhood that I know

somehow connected

To the culture of

This game;

I just can’t let it go

I guess it comes down to

What kind of world you want to live in

If diversity is disagreement

Disagreement is treason

Well don’t be surprised if we find ourselves reaping

A strange and bitter fruit

That sad old man beside you

Keeps feeding to young minds as virtue

It takes a village to raise a child

A flag to raze the children

Till they’re nothing more than ballasts for fulfilling

A madman’s dream of a paradise

Complexity reduced to black and white

How do I

Protect her from

This cult of death?