Get a tailor.
If speeches are edited, so should your clothes.
Suits shouldn’t be as big as your dreams.

Marry and be miserable;
or stay a bachelor and
bite the bullet at the ballot box.
Don’t love your mistresses.
Never let a mistress fall in love with you.

Cultivate coldness over glass of sweet tea
and write your principles in pencil,
but keep erasers handy.
Lead gets heavy with idealism.

Cover your tracks with charm,
but keep track of your steps.
Push down ladders as you climb them.

Finally, when you see your reflection in the gloss of your desk
and feel the smooth curves of your cherry bookshelves,
remember that under that finish are the remnants
of what once stood tall and proud.
A glossy exterior can only hope to mask a wild past.

And when you tire of tamed marble;
seeing yourself reflected in nature cut and polished,
come to the sea.
Cast off your leather shoes
– those casualties of your closet –
Roll your suit pants.
Stand firm and absolute.

You, the blond, bright-eyed pilgrim–
camouflaged in slate suits and
ties that hang like nooses.
Love the biting wind as it tousles your hair.
The coldness that demands to be felt.
Let it break like the surf, through your suit
and note the driftwood as it crashes to shore.
So smooth and strange.
A product of its past,
perfect in its imperfection.