Systemic, They Say. Poem by James Hart

“Systemic”, they say today
From Bankers to Police chiefs

Systemic is endemic;
It shuffles off the blame

It makes the matter impersonal,
It makes the blame general

It avoids a “Mea culpa”
It saves us saying “Sorry”

Systemic comes from systems
That are all made by humans

So mistakes are made by humans
Who make the faulty systems?

Nature doesn’t do it
No trees are orange by design

No trees are blue by mistake
Those would be systemic errors

But it doesn’t happen in nature
So why not say human for systemic?

©2009
James Hart