Wandering Wonderward: More Poetry from the End of the World

Making Things Right

A baby's angry cry is why we fly.
If we were ever satisfied
With anything we ever tried
We'd still be monkeys banished from the sky.
But nothing's ever good enough for us.
We can't scrape up an ounce of trust
To do the things we know we must
But we're real tough when we're anonymous.

We hate the world we've got from our first breath.
Take Mom and milk and lose the rest–
It's all downhill from that soft breast–
We all despise our lives while fearing death.
Your building blocks were always gonna fall.
You built them up for some hurrah,
But, flinching at some flash you saw,
You wrecked your work and cried about it all.

It's hatred of our lives that makes us work.
She knows she's due a better turn,
He's stinkin' rich, but he'll still yearn,
And everyone thinks everyone's a jerk.
You might not see the beauty in this plan.
But we can take a hit and stand,
And, frankly, increase our demand,
While fighting bravely for our fellow man.

We're driven by the things that we despise.
I wish we'd hold the hope that frees,
And end our own indignities,
But we learned to make power from those lies.
We're makers, we're creators, we are kings.
We'll dam a little native stream,
And run on a city on its steam
While counties feast on all the work it brings.

We bend the world to give us what we want.
There's magic in unhappy thoughts,
That makes us make up what is not,
And scrap Papyrus for a better font.
Dissatisfaction is the king of men.
It tell us we have lost the wind
Because of all the ways we've sinned,
But when we're told to stop, we just dig in.

Creation is the way to heal the ill;
She makes Destruction's hounds at last be still.