Creative Intermission

What would I change for this new year?

This I must answer in verbose poetic form.

This I will do, but let me be perfectly clear

What follows won’t make your insides feel warm.

For if I had my way, I would not have to write these.

I could devote my time to helping others.

Spend less time begging for money, “Oh please.”

I’d overhaul this system if I had my druthers.

There is only one way to be successful in life.

Get an education so that you can build a career.

If you don’t, you are left in poverty and strife.

So, therefore, I beg for your patronage this year

This system is broken. It is unfair and not right.

That so many of us must make such an enormous tough call.

Go to college for the chance to join the corporate dog fight

Or remain debt free and fold clothes at the mall

A well-informed public, the spine of a democratic nation

With a debt-free people, a great economy will cultivate

I believe in the promise of higher education.

But costing so much, our growth it does stagnate

As it is, I’ll graduate and owe roughly three teacher’s pay

Knowing there are tens of thousands out there just like me

Without fail, I apply for bits and pieces each day

To cut back on my loans from old Uncle Sammy

So when you ask we write you poems on change

I know what we all would change if we could

To a capitalist, free colleges sound strange

But I knew poets like yourselves probably understood

For I too truly love works of lyric and poetic forms

I once dreamed I could produce words of such beauty as Whitman’s

But I must major in business so I can pay back my loans

And hope this time is but creative intermission