Moving On

 Moving On

Friendship wasn't supposed to come
with a loyalty oath.

Yet here we are
where a handshake is a confession,
a conversation is evidence,
and guilt is assigned
by association alone.

Some people don't change.
They simply harden,

their hearts poured into concrete,
their thoughts outsourced
to whichever chorus
is loudest this week.

They call it conviction.
It looks more like surrender.

The crowd always needs a villain.
If they can't find one,
they'll invent one.
Truth is negotiable;
outrage is not.

The sharks never hunt alone.
They circle,
they scent weakness,
they feed on reputations
until nothing remains
but bones polished clean
by public approval.

And you, my friend,
mistook the feeding frenzy
for fellowship.

You believed loyalty
could survive politics.
You believed history,
shared laughter,
and years of trust
could outweigh a rumor,
a headline,
or someone else's permission.

You were wrong.

The jury had already spoken.
The sentence was exile.
The evidence never mattered.

So blow them a kiss
as they climb over one another
to claim the moral high ground,
measuring virtue
by how completely they erase
the people they once embraced.

Bow deeply if you must.
Open your wallet if that's the admission price.
Repeat the approved lines,
wear the approved colors,
hate the approved enemies.

They'll call it integrity.

Until the day
the spotlight turns,
the script is rewritten,
and they discover
they were never members of the jury

only the next defendant.

That is the bargain
of every political arena:
today's victor,
tomorrow's sacrifice.

The crowd never loved anyone.

It only loved
the spectacle.