Stress
Comes up in gassy eruptions.
Over and over,
I belch like a rumbling volcano
While my neighbor's baby
Cries through the night.

Paralyzed by nerves,
I'm so...
not a hero.
Just took two pills
the side effect of which
should make me functional tomorrow.

The main effect should ease this gas-
The manifestation of so much decomposition.
My love of country
is in crisis.
How to avoid perpetuating
a negative cycle?

Like Mary Poppins,
I want to ride my Mary-go-round horse
Off into the sunset
My pupils
gleefully
galloping
with me.

I'm not singing.
But bumbling through.
How to keep afloat
amidst all this well written wisdom
and the variations in spelling
and the power of just telling?

Let alone lead them down a path
That is smooth,
because life is rough.
And rough,
because life is rough.
And honest,
but not despairing.

Fretting over tomorrow
Instead of seeing the top of the mountain
In the distance.

This is a great chance
To ride the wave.
But that nasty undercurrent
has got me.

I need to love my home
In all it's (only recent) diplomacy.

And tell the beginning of a new story
where relations
are just that.