Society, your dream would have me beg
for pittance from a cruel employer’s hand,
and from my knees downward, not use my legs,
preferring that I genuflect, not stand,
to act as servant, bound to divine whim
that your appointed middlemen report.
What’s more, I must be weak, and bow to Him
who you insist directs my fate for sport.
No wonder I am just a half-grown lout
who spends my life in seeking childish joys,
when you have counseled me to forgo doubt
and are ashamed when men emerge from boys.
You take my destiny and claim my fate
should stay within the limits you proscribe,
denouncing me when I will not conform
or meekly take your bright and shiny bribe.
Who would choose the adulthood you profer,
all duty with no right, nor chance to rise?
No wonder most avoid it, or defer
a servitude unending ’til you die.
Yet when I pout and act a child of ten,
which seems how you and God define a man,
you feign surprise, and claim it’s always been
my choice to make; and either way, be damned.
13 APR 2005
