fined to mere
physical science given the nature of human opportunism.
Glance a map of central Europe for further insights. One
side always replaced the other when a "common," enemy
expired.

Boca might well have studied such eventualities.

Boca was a writer. More accurately, a "touch-dancer" with
the written phrase, deftly painting the catchy one-liner with
effortless ease and grace. Boca knew his craft, be it the
arena of story, poem, drama, (it didn't matter the genre).
Unfortunately, his oeuvre remained fixed and static. Boca
never progressed beyond titles.

"A right, jolly good thing, too", said Boca in his own
defense.

The short burst counted most, whether in thought, sport or
field of battle. The utterance of a single breath. That was
it! It all lay in the aside, the pun, a retort, the recit. If this
were all to the story, there would be no doubt whatsoever;
Boca excelled.

"In the briefest expression, perhaps", said the critics. But,
as they were quick to point out, it didn't lead "anywhere".

"Where is the larger, more important fruit? His finished
verbal passion?", intoned one.

Still, this chance fortune led to the inspiration (and success)
of unusually vivid titles.

But ... titles? Just "titles", said others nervously? Yes,
proclaimed Boca. Titles. Not epithets, or rejoinders,
cat-calls even repartee.

Not even wit in the normal understanding of the term. Just
mere titles. Bushel-baskets of them. Worried looks crept
onto the onlookers' faces.

Encyclopaedic came the flowering. Ad factories should
have tapped such a larder. Any creative department could
have done worse than with Boca's dripping imagery and gift
for the keynote phrase.

"There is majesty here", said one, "and more than a little
Blake. I am reminded of the great symbolists."

"One has to be practical", cautioned still another. "What's
here is hardly epigrammatic or even purely an aphorism in
any truer sense of the word."

"I'm simply perplexed", said the man finally to his
colleague and both left without further ado or thought to
Boca's work.

Indeed Boca loved his words, tinkering with the very
essence of language.

"A great beginning", cheered a rare voice. "Let's hope one
without premature end."

Boca continued to conceive titles by the hundreds. He
didn't merely dream up a few, in snatches, he proliferated
them in