Puppet master, hold my strings

Guide me toward the beautiful things

Without your idle, gentle touch

I never would amount to much

Temptations I could not resist

Without your knowing hand and fist

If I dart toward a shiny stone,

A treasure, maybe, a golden throne,

Avert me fast, pull me back

I mustn’t be so quick to act

Against your will I’d dumbly stand,

If you did not keep a steady hand

My own impulse, explore and learn,

Could lead me to a death unearned

Puppet master, don’t relax,

I may ever need your honest facts

Not these lies and thin half-truths

Surrounding me in my eager youth

The path is thin, the beam is weak

To me, the silvery liars speak

Adjust my ears, o holder of strings,

Block out those disagreeable things

And as I wander less and less,

My master’s hand may soon digress

But, trained well, I shan’t retry

To ask the questions which burned inside

My youthful heart, so blindly bright

Now I’ve seen your true insight

Those wonderings, now, can be ignored

Thanks to your truer side of lore

Puppet master, it’s thanks I owe,

You’ve saved me endless pain and woe

Had I dared to open that door,

I could be hurting so much more

Had I heard those silvered tales,

My own life could have seemed pale

Perhaps a few would not have hurt

Maybe my mind could be more alert

But I had no need for idle fancies

When all the while you were with me

Puppet master, I’m older now,

Soon my light will flicker out

Let me ask you one last time,

A question from my burning prime:

Master, if your touch is blessed,

My life lived without misstep,

If you are ever called my true creator,

How came you to be named manipulator?