7. (?) .2006

Slam into the wall and
as the salt spreads through your mouth realize that
no one's fighting for you and you're fighting
only for yourself and that you can't
stop to help the ones that
look like you could change them, you will
never, ever change them, you will only end up
bleeding all over your nice new clothes
that you bought just the other day, dressed to impress
fine men and ladies who have
eyes made out of metal that can
pierce you just like bullets and that
know just where you're weak:
everywhere, if they can just pull off
the perfect April Fools' joke (they call it
love, greatest of all of the
human's follies, perhaps aside from trust)
but for some reason kids are still taught that we must
demonstrate only good and virtue, we must always tell the truth
they never notice tongues rattling all of Teacher's fine teeth loose
with hypocrisy and doublespeak, forcing naivete on the weak
rather than survival, caution, reservation
the vitality of hesitation before
handshakes and signatures or openings of
back room doors; nobody warns the innocent
that there is no fair in love and war.