Silence Mr. Killjoy!

[Standing in the corner of a public room filled with people a woman thinks to herself and ponders her observations about a certain Mr. Killjoy.]

You may be invited,

Mr. Killjoy,

But rarely welcome.

You never notice our glances

To the Exit sign

Or how we recoil from every chance

To converse with you.

Stealing our time

Without guilt or shame

With apparently no ability to hear,

You speak or glower

At all who are near

With a near deadly aim.

No matter the hour

Or who careens or cowers

Your only choice

Is to worship one thing:

The sound of your own voice.

 

No one cheers

Upon your approach

But dreads the impending deluge

Of your tongue’s venom

And frequent reproaches.

Desperately they seek a refuge

But failing to find one

They try to hide their ears

To allay their fears

You will corner them

And make a mourner of them.

 

How often you bend our ears low,

Forcing them to nearly break

From the volume of your torrents

And weight of your proclamations

As our peace drowns in the current

Of your constant promulgations.

Just how much more must we take

Of your unending criticisms?

You ever assume

Your every grievance and witticism

Deserve to be heard

And given applause;

Without our instant acclamation,

Your lips quickly become buzz saws

To cut the knees out from under us.

 

You only rejoice

In saying your piece,

Carping without respect or care,

Devouring our every effort

To interject or share.

Our hearts cascade

Into fragments without number

From the piercings of your sword

Yet your mind slumbers,

Deaf to our grieving

And all other noises

As it gives way to every inclination

Found in the abundance of your heart.

Amidst your demands and expectations

You prove again and again

Our value is nothing to you

With every intonation and off-key chord

You endlessly employ

In singing your songs of sixpence

That never serenades

But only annoys.

Your only smiles

Are but preludes

To dropping the hammer

And no matter

How we wince or stammer

In an effort of defense

You know no mercy or grace

In truth or even pretense.

 

How you never tire

As you persist day after day

In blustering and blundering

With oration after oration thundering,

Like a much too loud

One man choir

With diatribes and tirades

Never measured or thought out

As you set the world on fire.

With your innumerable complaints

You consistently whine and flout

All other opinions,

Surveying your dominion

With disagreeableness and lack of restraint,

And attempts at self-aggrandizing clout,

Condemning any dissent

Dissatisfied with one and all,

No matter the strength of their arguments.

Can no one meet your measure?

Is anyone your treasure

Or just the target of your unending abuse

At your unending leisure?

Surely you must be worn out

And ravenous

From all of your tongue’s exercise

But I doubt you ever

Take time to eat

Lest you swallow your own words

And find them bitter

Though you thought them so sweet

When uttered.

Your refusal to address and excise

The corruption in your heart,

The roots of your rotten fruit,

Make you less a man

And more a brute.

 

Silence Mr. Killjoy!

Must you go on and on so?!

Do you ever stop for a breath,

To inhale a thought?

Is there no end to your babbling

And profusion of words

Or will you continue without ceasing

Until you have no strength left?

You are a blowhard

Always demanding to be heard

But rarely worth hearing.

Such wounds you inflict

Without a thought or hesitation!

Such boasting of triumphs

And amplification even of failures.

You’re the one we are always fearing,

The fomenter of conflict

And king of depredation

You have no perception

Of how you sound

Long lost in self-deception

And unaware

Not everyone is a sounding board

For every idea you have lost and found.

Your tongue is your favorite toy,

Your voice your favorite song,

As you ramble on and on

Like a baby boy

Overjoyed at first learning to talk.

 

Do you not know

Every idle word

Will be given an account of?

Every thing not spoken in love

You will disdain

And find no joy

In all of your purposeless words

And one-sided conversations;

One day you will be ashamed

Of your own name

And regret all you destroyed

For your own gain

And selfish desire for fame.

 

O poor Mr. Killjoy,

How I pity you!

Only a fool utters all his mind

And talks all the time.

For it is impossible to not find sin

In a multitude of words.

Though you wonder at your troubles

And often see your plans

Turn to rubble

You return to the folly

Of your familiar ways

Never using your lips for praise

Of the One

Who knows every word

Before you do.

If only you were swift to hear

And slow to speak,

Perhaps then your outlook

Wouldn’t appear so bleak

And you could find

The peace you seek.

It may be true

You are in your glory

With any audience you can find

But glory doesn’t become you.

God is in His Heaven

And you are on Earth

So, maybe, just maybe, for once

You should put your hand to your mouth

And let your words be few.