The trouble with boiling all our troubles
Down to personal responsibility
Is that sometimes
Our best intentions just aren’t enough.
Sometimes
The odds are too unbalanced
The winds of adversity
At gale force.
For those of us who grew up
Under the shadows of failed leadership
It was often pressed upon us
To not complain
But rather look within
When things go wrong
And to never lend serious thought
To doing something about the fact that
The game has been rigged
Our tyres have been slashed
Our inheritance squandered.
They’ve told young people
To basically suck it up,
Forcing them to only rise
By means of rebellion-
Instead of standing on the shoulders
Of our leaders
We battle them.
Or alternatively,
This call to self-preservation
In the face of disaster
Is actually a recipe for our resignation
In the middle of what is meant to be
Our heydays,
Where we’re supposed to be
Giving our best strength
To causes bigger than ourselves.
Maybe we aren’t lazy.
Backward.
Given to smallness.
Maybe we are decent people
Who have found ourselves
At the mercy of tyrants
And failed systems.
Self help only goes
So far.
Fix the system.
heartinscriber 