Back in the days of our innocent youth
With Christmas a strict institution
The story was shared as indelible truth
Enough to suppress evolution

Remember the Wise Men who travelled
To witness the birth of the King
But mythology slowly unraveled
Replaced by some bells on a string

Remember the days of the shepherds
When angels and elders conspired
When prophets laid hands on the lepers
But lately so few are inspired

Back in the days of the loaves and the fishes
A rabbi gave sight to the blind
He’s not what we’d label ambitious
But he suffered as he was designed

Back in the times of the Goddess
The giver of life and of grains
We honor the cycles she taught us
Those patterns survive in our brains

Remember there’s seasons for living
To harvest and seasons to sow
For death and for birth and thanksgiving
Just a handful of stages to know

When negative thoughts are uprooted
So sadness and fear are excluded
Then shunning adversity
Stifles diversity
Leaving the landscape denuded

There’s a mind that relentlessly rioted
And honestly couldn’t be quieted
Distraught by illusion  
It hungered for fusion
Like Plato’s original dyad did

There’s a novel in which I’ve been caught
But my storyline’s tied in a knot
Come villain or lover
I’m drawn to discover
The author who penciled my plot

There’s a state of profound integration
But the ego demands separation
       So the mind flips about
       Like a panicky trout
Who’s deprived of essential hydration

Our crude imperfections they serve to remind
     Of the ****** limits by which we’re defined
               And so I surmise
               That you need not despise
     The ephemeral flaws of a natural kind

I once met a forestry ranger
In the depths of a dimly lit wood
She warned me to steer clear of danger
And I told her I would if I could

I then met a four-eyed doctor
Who diagnosed me with unhealthy skin
In the very short time that I talked to her
She observed it was dangerously thin

I next met a forensic detective
Who examined the mud on my shoes
And recommended a thicker protective
To shield my poor soles from abuse

I then met a foreign ambassador
From a kingdom remote and removed
Exotic but totally taciturn
Her statements could not be disproved

I later met a forlorn professor
And assumed we might get along swimmingly
Like a shipwreck I tried to impress her
But her preference inclined to the simile

I furthermore met a fortune teller
On a poorly paved path to the beach
She foresaw not a single best-seller
Overburdened with figures of speech