The Outsider

 

Work commitments are taking over my life at present, so I don’t have much time to write or even think about interesting blog post topics.  So here is a poem I wrote a couple of weeks ago. Does anyone else keep on changing a poem every time they look at it?  I never seem to be able to find a final version for them.

I wish my parents had built me in the selfish version,
not taught me to think of others, nor walk in their shoes.
I wish they’d told me to hold out for Jimmy Choos
and that worth is indeed measured in status and cents.

I wish they’d taught me to interrupt and shout louder
to cover the world’s cacophony,
that my views are more important and right than anyone else’s in the room,
not always to listen and ponder in the shallows of impartiality,
to see the world in black and white instead of always turning the coin over
to check the other side.
And why, oh why always give second chances, three and four? Turn other cheeks?

I wish I did not feel tugs of guilt at each morsel
thrown out, not used to feed the starving child.
I wish those wide eye, distended bellies would not haunt my cupboards,
nor air miles prevent me buying sweet fruit I know I’d love.
I wish I’d never been introduced to Patience, Prudence and Humility,
three sisters who’ve slaked me of my appetite to win,
murdered my ambition, till faintest echoes of boasting
make me sneer, laugh and shiver.

Yet disdain is all fine and good.
No one cares, disdained by me.
Adulated by masses, emboldened by success,
They fail, repeat, never learn, repent no more.
While I nurse, bruised and battered, an ego like an unboiled egg,
integrity left orphan in a world I fail to fathom.