| Dear Ron MacLean
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| Dear Coach’s Corner
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| I’m writing in order
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| For someone to explain
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| To my niece the distinction
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| Between these mandatory pre-game group rites of submission
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| And the rallies at Nuremberg
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| Specifically the function
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| The ritual serves in conjunction
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| With what everybody knows
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| Is in the end a kid’s game
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| I’m just appealing to your sense of fair play
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| When I say she’s puzzled by
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| This incessant pressure for her to not defy
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| Collective will yellow-ribboned lapels
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| As the soldiers inexplicably rappel
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| Down from the arena rafters
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| If it not so insane
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| They’ll be grounds for screaming laughter
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| Dear Ron MacLean
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| I wouldn’t bother with these questions
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| If I didn’t sense some spiritual connection
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| We may not be the same
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| But it’s not like we’re from different planets
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| We both love this game so much we can hardly fucking stand it
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| Alberta-born and Prairie-raised
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| Ain’t a sheet of ice north of Fargo I ain’t played
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| Penhold to the Gatineau
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| Every fond memory of childhood that I know
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| somehow connected
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| To the culture of
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| This game; |
| I just can’t let it go
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| I guess it comes down to
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| What kind of world you want to live in
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| If diversity is disagreement
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| Disagreement is treason
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| Well don’t be surprised if we find ourselves reaping
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| A strange and bitter fruit
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| That sad old man beside you
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| Keeps feeding to young minds as virtue
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| It takes a village to raise a child
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| A flag to raze the children
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| Till they’re nothing more than ballasts for fulfilling
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| A madman’s dream of a paradise
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| Complexity reduced to black and white
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| How do I
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| Protect her from
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| This cult of death? |