Folly of the Old Man

Hey old man, in your youth you disdained the past, thinking it antiquated, obsolete, a silly relic of superstitious beliefs no longer needed; you abandoned it, left it for dead in the wilderness of quasi-neutrality.   You left the carrion of what was once tradition, culture, heritage, history... identity to the predators of innovation.  You left it to the sanitizing of consolidated power and to the whims of the sensitivities of sensitive people who have not earned the right to complain.  You forfeited etiquette for political correctness/expedience. You abdicated your responsibility of the narrative of your fathers.  Your arrogance lead you to speak only of the novelties of modernization, bells and whistles, technology, the legitimacy of science and illegitimacy of anything else.  You exchanged the development of the beliefs of layers of generations, at least six thousand years of recorded history, for the sterility of modernity.

You owe us a story.  Where is the narrative that lead the generations before us? Where are the stories of passion, virtue, honor... wisdom.  The stories that connected us?  The stories that kept us close one to another and, we, to the world around us?  You buried them, but they have not been lost.  You obscured them, but they have not changed in substance.  Truth is not relative. Truth transcends time.  You mistook the package in which truth was wrapped as the object; you mistook the rumors for the message.

We have partaken of the increased knowledge of this age.  It's pleasing to the eye, so promising, and pleasing to the taste.  It has been found lacking and is no substitute for life.  No substitute for roots; no substitute for a heritage.

Now then, Elihu make your stand:
Set the record straight;
Give us the narrative our fathers no longer recognize

Josiah, uncover the wisdom of old:
Reintroduce us to form that functions;
Challenge the new conventional

Thinkers, question:
Ask, "Why;"
Let how take care of itself

Artists, express:
Tell it like it is;
Call the bluff

Preachers, proclaim:
Pierce with words spoken;
Inspire

Filmmakers, reconstruct:
Dare to imagine;
Share with us stories recently forgotten

Musicians, yawp:
Wake us from our slumber;
Set us dancing to a new tune just unearthed

Prophets, speak:
Lament, then rejoice in the hope you see;
Craft your words until reality is right

Young men, revolt:
Hunger and thirst;
Pursue evil dressed in light until it's been undone

Entertainers, shh:
Sit back and learn;
Retract your talents until you've had time to ferment,
Until you have become meaningful,
Until your message becomes art