Written in 1865, before the typewriter, this is from Alice in Wonderland, Chapter III, “A Caucus Race and a Long Tale” by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson):

                      "It _is_ a long tail, certainly," said Alice, looking
                     down with wonder at the Mouse's tail; "but why do you
                     call it sad?" And she kept on puzzling about it while the
                     Mouse was speaking, so that her idea of the tale was
                     something like this:----"Fury said to
                               a mouse, That
                                     he met in the
                                          house, `Let
                                              us both go
                                                 to law: _I_
                                                  will prose-
                                                   cute _you_.--
                                                  Come, I'll
                                                 take no de-
                                              nial: We
                                           must have
                                        the trial;
                                     For really
                                   this morn-
                                 ing I've
                                nothing
                               to do.'
                                Said the
                                 mouse to
                                   the cur,
                                      `Such a
                                         trial, dear
                                             sir. With
                                               no jury
                                                or judge,
                                                  would
                                                 be wast-
                                               ing our
                                             breath.'
                                          `I'll be
                                       judge,
                                    I'll be
                                  jury,'
                                said
                               cun-
                               ning
                                old
                                  Fury:
                                   `I'll
                                      try
                                        the
                                         whole
                                          cause,
                                           and
                                          con-
                                        demn
                                    you to
                               death'."

People often ask how to simplify compliance in information security and governance. They want to know if it can all be boiled together. I remember one CIO who said “just give me one list!”

I had put together a couple slides on why this is an 80/20 question, never a perfect fit, but I like how the Dead Prez rhyme a similar answer:

“Crack is like a Democrat; Cocaine Republican; Marijuana Independent Party. Same government…”

I guess I’m intentionally being opaque on this to protect my own rhymes, besides the fact that theirs are probably better anyway. Imagine a board room where a security consultant performs a poetic recital of risks. Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. It will be subtle, trust me.

Similarities and differences. Analysis is not synthesis.

Every age has its own poetry; in every age the circumstances of history choose a nation, a race, a class to take up the torch by creating situations that can be expressed or transcended only through poetry.

— Jean-Paul Sartre