Mea Culpa

Deem this outlook nought but staid,
and let propriety be made
excuse, for honey-sweetened prose;
ignore the thorns and scent the rose.

Fair waft, on what you choose to hear,
for are you not the puppeteer
and in control of all the strings,
that marionettes may dance through rings?

It’s true, life visits cruel sport
on hearts and minds, creating tort
or so it seems, to those who play
arenas, that are clouded grey.

But all, when all is said and done,
cannot be lost, when never won.
For structures are not all they seem,
when built upon a winsome dream.

Dreams rely not on good sense,
though camouflage incompetence
sufficiently, that we reject
that, which we would and should select.

Mistakes become as lessons learned,
the price may be much harder earned
and pain, regret or…even worse,
may lighten well the fullest purse.

The world, in heartless careless spite,
will turn and burn, unseemly bright.
And you, though caught in life’s abyss,
must start your metamorphosis.

I well accept the part I played,
when from the chosen road, I strayed.
Temptation, clothed in such mystique,
finds easy pickings midst the weak.

Do I regret such dalliance?
Oh yes, oh yes and if perchance,
that time I could manipulate,
I would wash well this tainted slate.

And so the rose you stalwart hold,
may well be seeming withered; cold.
I do now what I do - distressed;
With mea culpa, beat my breast.

Chris Birrane © 2012