Facebook polemic

There is no shame in dying, at whatever age. There is no shame in how we die, though some deaths might be prevented, were we to talk out loud about them. The shame is in the silences around the deaths. Can we not speak of them, rather than googling awful gossipy websites? Can we not use ourselves, poets, as examples of the suffering our sick culture creates and then refuses to treat in a compassionate way? Can there be compassion without speech? (I think not.)

 

Note: "speech" in the last sentence is intended in the sense of "communication," "opening up conversation," not in the sense simply of talking.