I leave that to those more knowledgeable and coherent on the subject. But it's only natural to be affected by events, especially after partying yesterday at the house of shy retiring Avedon Carol.
Here in Snailville I've been looking at ostensibly lighter matters, and was directed by Languagehat to this Chinese poetry site. Unable to resist even a non-Japanese poet with the name Su Shi, I found
Visiting the Temple of the God of Mercy on a Rainy Day
The silkworms grow old,
The wheat half yellow,
The rain falls unrestrained about the mountain.
The farmers cannot work the land,
Nor women gather mulberry,
The Immortals sit high in white robes in the hall.
Meanwhile, Renee Perelmutter at glosses.net rambles entertainingly and cites a Sumerian translation The Seven, including
They are strangers to pity, compassion is far from them
They are deaf to men's prayers, entreaties can't reach them
They are horses that grow to great size, that feed on mountains
They are the enemies of our friends
They feed on the gods
They tear up the highways they spread out over the roads
They are the faces of evil they are the faces of evil
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues -
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et Decorum Est
Pro patria mori.