apologia pro cornballism mea

Marriedski brushed a blonde tendril from her eye.
It was her glorious golden hair.
She was not being attacked by an octopus with highlights.
Around us the Muse Cafe burbled.
She brushed her hair back and fixed me with a vary hard stare indeed.
"My marriage is in trouble," she told me.
I did my best to return her stare without the hardness but also without any possibility of misunderstanding.
"Everyone's marriage is in trouble," I said soft as iron. "Everyone has these problems. It's the way of the world. You can overcome them. In a short while the problems will seem less powerful. Then they will be gone completely."
We talked a few minutes longer.
Then she returned to her life.
After she had left me, the ghost of Boris Pasternak appeared at my table.
"Close one there Heelers," he murmured, stroking his beard.
I quaffed my coffee.
"Not at all," sez I. "There was no badness in it. She was just looking for advice."
The great Pasternak raised bushy Russian eyebrows and grinned.
"Ha!" he proclaimed. "Now who's a deluded purveyor of naive socialistic fantasies?"