Woe is Me  


Might parental upbringing be but a whirlwind
wavering over the quicksand of youthful fear?

As children, should there be lessons learned
through the ignorance of grace
and the false power of intimidating?

Our adolescence provides so many missteps
we embrace without reason,
even though we possess the sure-footedness,
but choose to ignore the balance offered.

And then there is adulthood,
where words and actions are often
expressed with hatred and judgment,
even as our innate nature is to accept
rather than reject,
empathize, rather than criticize,
embrace rather than self-destruct.

Instead of discovering errors as revelatory,
we try the “woe is me” with mistakes,
enjoining the pandemic of victimization,
all the while forgetting the choice of grace
we so often visited upon in our childhood playground…

so long ago.