I can never reason whether precociousness

is an exceptional gift or a profound burden.

Sitting on a tree limb, watching

-ever watching-

hating the other children

and condemning them for lack of conviction.

Eyes burning; tiny fists clenched

-lapses of silent contemplation-

Anger surging through my blood like poison

Guilt, a shallow substitution for redemption

Prodigy, prodigy

That’s what they call me.

While the other children laugh

My name is lost to them beneath a title.

My future: bleak and obsolete.

My true intentions murdered by your expectations

Prodigy, prodigy

Why don’t you smile?

What do you mean, ‘desolation’?

Quietly, quietly the prodigy bleeds

plagued by resentment

destined for the fall