Dan Williams

Wandering Man

Once, the flavor of friendliness was savored,

honor could be detected with without a fight.

Doors hung unlocked, secure enough overnight

till bandits and politicians came in past no fences;

kindness, over harsh conduct, was favored.

 

The man from denied reality encountered these fictions

about not recognizing how that really feels

with the dogs of remorse nipping at his heels.

His unfocused thoughts wandering, wondering

which way to sail, in which unreconnoitered direction.

 

Trying to stop progress with hand me down tools,

looking down at the street to see what is up,

seeking generous financing with a beggar’s cup.

Trying to navigate the future with no moral compass,

inspired by adult fairy tales accepted by fools.

 

Trying to be attuned to music life might be aware of

seeking melodies to which he can dance

instead finds mostly only dissonance.

The wandering man grows discouraged,

finding blind acceptance something to beware of.

 

 Only now he perceives the greed

at the heart of all the different misery

humans create but then refuse to see;

takes too many forms and leads to that blindness

to the remedies the fools really do need.

 

Trying to paint the future with brushes worn by excuses,

stepping through this apocalypse dance,

no extinction will be left to chance.

No one will be spared to say they told you so,

their utopian dreams will have worn out their uses.

 

Just as arrogance has shipwrecked and exposed them

heads will fall, names will be written,

the fools will never know what hit them,

their fictional version of truth stripped from them,

every door they had forced open will be closed to them.