Play It Out

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Produce!
Most everybody wants to.
Deep down,
we yearn to bear fruit,
grow a new person,
and craft our own sad clone.
Me, but undepressed—
there's so much that we’ll do better.
We could raise them so unfettered!
Fewer restrictions.
Break the rigid rules,
old molds.
We need a chance
for a revision—
a second draft.
Let’s start again.
Amen.
Go forth!
Multiply as was commanded
by your God in that green Garden.
But forbidden fruit
just tasted too damned sweet.
Now the angel stands,
flaming sword
at gates of Eden.
Heels are bruised,
and wombs are bleeding.
We fucked it up!
Let’s try and start again.
But I'm afraid,
that I can't play—
N-no—
I can’t play this out.
My sick dream—
I have a child.
I cry tears of joy
every time they smile.
And for their gain,
I'd walk a thousand miles,
while cloying clichés
and complaints pour
from my mouth:
It’s so hard to be a parent,
but I’d never trade it in.
Bullshit.
Alright, it’s not,
but I just can’t abide it!
I’ll reject the played display:
Jackasses still bray,
and joke jovially,
but honestly assign their kids the blame
for the dead dreams gone to waste
scribbled outlines from a day
before they fucked around,
got knocked up, tied down,
and decided that it’s too late.
And then they say
that I’m too callow,
that I’m too shallow—
Bullshit.
What is this grotesque game?
It’s not my turn!
I’ll take a pass
and decide that
I can’t play—
I want out!
Who am I exactly,
to play the role of God?
Why should I create?
Spare the child!
Spank the rod.
Who am I to instruct?
All I’d do is disrupt—
pass old traumas on,
help them make some new ones up.
I love my kids,
that’s why I won’t force
this existence onto them.
Amen.
Or let them grow
to know
my regret
as resentment!
Stay put!
Divide!
You’ll be undefined
unless you fall in line!
One and one just might make three
if you’re unlucky.
Be alone.
Everybody wants to,
deep down.
Nobody wants to understand
no one else.
And I'm so afraid
that I will stay this way,
And when I die,
the minister will shake
his head at me,
and to an empty room he’ll say:
He could have been a father.
He could have shown someone the light
in themselves—
But he mucked it up!
Now drop him down!
He died alone
because he never played it out.
Amen.