Who I Am

Mere Children Say Dreadful Things

Everyone agrees children are miserable creatures

Mere children say dreadful things

What of it if those things are true

And shouldn’t be spoken in polite company

Should we not blame the parents

Who refused to dress you in clean clothes

Or forgot to bathe you before school

Children are miserable creatures with dreadful things to say

Although many of us have not apologized

For our part in your psychological torture

I hope you have melded into society

A productive citizen with tons of friends

For even if you’re still weird

Weird is a normative feature seen all around

If one only cares to look

Weird was something one could live with and accept

But what if weird comes packaged

In clothes worn the day before and smelling of urine

Well, mere children will say dreadful things

We don’t care for polite society

We only live for the truth

And the truth was you should blame our parents

For releasing us dreadful creatures to the world

Or society for not treating its ails long before we walked the earth

For children are products of their society

And while your parents may not have been able

To spend the time or money to ensure

A crisp new you everyday

The society should have hugged you

And made the ails go away

For children, as miserable as they are,

They only ever speak their truth

As dreadful as it may be

So as I look back at my childhood

And remember your face and name

I hope name didn’t become faceless

Or the other way around

Which may be all the same

And though we may all be weird

In each our own little way

I wish you all the joy and happiness

That children had stolen away

With great pride I ask you

To reflect on the ails of our society

As not the dreadfulness of children

But the invisibility of the helpless

And raise with me a better future

As I know you do not still wet the bed