Shortly after the school systems began defecating on the dreams of my generation,
We found different outlets
Through which we could bring our loathing to a head.
My generation now writes poetry and
Finds solace in video games we can beat
In lives we can't seem to live the right way.

It's funny to me that The Legend of Zelda,
When completed,
Tells you that "You are great!"
While your teacher berates you for being sub-par
Though you tried your damnedest
To please them through drafts and drafts
And drafts of work
Spat out at 4am because
There are more important things to deal with
In regular waking hours,
In regular waking life.

They tell us that we have failed
Because we ****** up in one class,
A single credit,
A single number on a sheet of paper
That tries to measure us
When we can't even attempt to do the same.
They tell us we have failed
Because we do not look good on file
And apparently we do not look good
Walking down the street
With ****** eyes and baggy sweaters,
The only clean clothes we own
Because the system has ****** us clean of time
To do much else than
Study, study, STUDY our **** lives away.

This is atrocious.
When a young boy feels more accomplished
Beating Pokemon
Than he does when he writes a stellar paper,
The best he can pen
Only to be told he has a lot more work to do
And that the paper
"Is good...
But it needs work."

The culture of my generation does not discriminate.
It does not tell us that we have more work to do.
Instead, it tells us that "we are great" and
It gives us a restart screen when we **** up beyond repair.
It does not tell us we have failed,
Instead offers us a kind
"Try again?"

It is sad
When the voice over of a video game
Offers more kindness
Than our instructors and parents
Combined.

School should not send us home, wanting to **** ourselves.
The system should not make a pen cap,
A pair of underpants, a simple metal bookmark
A weapon
In the hands of the human entity of depression.

We will not be marked suicide risks.
As long as we keep getting our restart screens and
Compliments from bits,
We will triumph.
We will be the heroes of our generation
As long as we keep getting the chance.

One day, when all the suffering is over
And we have escaped this war-torn soul of "The Caring Community,"
Maybe those words will extend from an NES and find their way
Into the mouth of a boyfriend, girlfriend,
Wife, husband, friend, professor...

Someday, we will hear the words and we will truly believe them.

"You are great!"

Maybe not today...

But someday.

Soon.

I was not the one who lost your ******* daughters shoes.
I did not force you
To have *** with a man
Who you viewed as a mistake in the first place;
I did not force you to **** him,
Sans ******
And bring me into the world.

***** do not know what they are racing to
And if they did,
I can assure you that no one,
No one
Would be here today.

I did not tie your tubes
And force you to raise three children
When you are still a child yourself,
Unaware of the grace of JFK
And knowledge of basic admiration
That fuels the care of this world.

I did not make you become void and listless,
I did not make you my personal servant
Rather, you made me yours.
I did not ask for such torture as this,
Bleeding my veins through everything,
Loving me only when you are out of smokes
And want a cigarette.

I did not ruin your life
And I did not waste my time
Trying to make you happy through these years.
I attempted to better myself
All the while looking at you for reference.

Do not blame me
And look at me as if I were a criminal
When I pack up my things
And run, run
Run the hell away from you.

Because I was not the one who ****** up in the first place.
I was not the one
Who lost your ******* daughters shoes.

On the first day, I'll look to you
And see the light of the Earth
Alive in everything you do.
And on the second day,
I'll create my own world of seclusion
Away from all of your ignorance.
But they can't all be ballads
Because where would suffering
Finally find its home?

On the third day, I'll discover
Folk music and rhyme.
I'll waste my time
Seeing what isn't there,
The ideals I've made my shelter.
On the forth day
I'll hold you in my arms,
Kiss you deeper than I ever have.
Force you into things you don't understand.
Because you're like a thirty-something year old ******,
Thinking a metal underwire is a pack of smokes.
But they can't all be ballads,
They can't all be the same.
If they were,
None of us would be in possession of our names.

On the fifth day,
I'll leave you after finding discontentment
Over how you find upset in unfamiliar places
And make minnows into whales.
On the sixth day, I'll regret it
But have nothing left to say...

They can't all be ballads anyway.

Maybe one day I'll come to a stoplight
And see an old Mercedes sedan
And think the driver to be you.
Maybe so.
I'll never be able to completely cleanse my mind
Of the memories we made;
I know that.
Some day, I'll have my radio blasting,
"All You Need is Love" will play
And perhaps I will shed a tear.
But I won't know until I get out of this rut-
Pry myself from this dark, cold hole
And try again.
Maybe one day I'll see a teenage girl walk by
With a Let it Be shirt on
And you'll be the first person to come to mind.
Perhaps I'll use my Mercurochrome once more
And remember how you introduced it to me.
I'll remember that not even Mercurochrome
Can fix my broken heart.
Nothing can. Except the second chance
I'm giving myself.
I also suppose I will never stop at a BP for gas
And I'll never be able to look at Elton John
The same way again.
I can live with that.
I'll forever be reminded of you
By the Rescuers ornament on my Christmas tree
And James Bond.
One day,
I'll be dusting off my records.
One by one, cleaning their plastic covers
Until I reach Band On the Run.
Then I'll have to smile fondly
And laugh at the fun we had.
I suppose you'll always be on my mind;
A year can do a lot to a person.
But one thing I'll never forget
Is our fun memories
And your old Mercedes sedan.

My teddy bear is dying.
It cannot see the light.
My teddy bear is dying,
But it's trying to fight.

My teddy bear is burning
As it is held over the lit stove.
My teddy bear is burning
And I have not been told.

My teddy bear is drowning;
Its polyester is soaked with sea.
My teddy bear is dying
And it cannot see me.

It cannot see me as I cry
Praying to God it will not die...
But as it drowns, it will not see
That with it, my childhood is dying in me.

My teddy bear is dying...
Someone?
Pull it up from the sea
And please save me.

I swear we were loosing it.
How can you expect a regular man
To last longer than a week
Alone
On an island of sanity
Amid an ocean or insanity?
How could you expect me to zip my mouth up
Like a woman's dress
And keep calm about my situation?
How could you let me count off the numbers
Only to put them back once again?
How could you think
That white walls
And impertinent lies
Could mask the suffering fear
Swelling inside of me?
How could you touch me
With those cold unfeeling hands
As my friends washed up on the shore
More dead than they ever could have been?
How could you lay me out in the sun,
Watch crimes unfold
While you still expected me to be a regular man once home?
In that moment
With the knife lingering over my scalp,
I made a decision to get the Hell out
And I have no regrets regarding it.
You can chase me down:
Scream at me,
Rap your knuckles at my door.
I'll tell you to put it where the sun don't shine
Along with a dishonorable Section 8 discharge
And the little bits of my decrepit sanity.

I got judged all this morning
On how well I could fill in bubbles
On a Scantron sheet.
Well,
My friend Johnny
Hasn't got any arms.
How do you suppose
We measure his intelligence
If he cannot fill in the bubbles?