Hypocrisy to what you preach
Expecting standards of another
You, yourself can never reach

Guised as a victim in your speech
Painting yourself the saint
The all knowing prophet
When pointing fingers is all you teach

Your mirror is no more than a rose pane
In it your lacks shine as another man’s toll
Pleas for reason fall in vane
All collapsing at your need of control

Perched upon your pedestal
Passing judgement all the stay
At all costs emotionally vigil
For it’s always “Your Way”

Hypocrisy in what you teach
Learn to practice what you preach

"Raise your hand if you're messed up".
That's what I heard but not what they said.
My hand slowly rises and they grin.
Fresh meat.
Then they proceed with uncanny resemblance to TV.

State your name, to be added to the menu.
They want more details, er ingredients.
Their eyes are locked, watching for golden brown.
Lapping lips, heads droopy and bobbing,
The blood in my neck runs cold and then clotting,

****.
This place is over-*******-flowing with vulnerability vultures.
My fight or flight kicks in and I become needlessly angry.
Why the hell am I here?
He's not my problem anymore.
Why the hell am I mad?
He's not my problem anymore.

But I sit and I listen to the  man on my right.
He shields his eyes and I know why.
The longer you sit, the longer they glare,
The longer they hope your gaze transforms
Into yet another hungry vulture's stare.

What balm is there
in being right?
Especially rightness,
righteousness
grounded in bitterness--
are you joining me in my misery?

I do not want
my happiness to come
at the expense of yours--
as if there were some
limited supply of it;
some small cupful--
snatching at the drops
that fall.

If I want compassion+mercy
extended to me
then I **** well better
extend it to others.

And so I go forward,
waving olive branches.

Will you grasp back?