Teach Your Children Well

We thought we could change the world,
a new society,
the great experiment,
that we were different,
knew more, knew better,
part of the solution
not part the problem,
make love not war,
tune in, drop out,
hell no, we won’t go,
rebels with a cause,
defenders of the righteous,
crusaders of a higher standard,
a new code;

instead we became
more of the same.

Hypocrites within a world
of hypocrites,
masters of enlightenment
without light,
monsters disguised as
children of peace,
dogs licking up
their own vomit,
white-washed sepulchers,
dry bones,
sheep without a Shepard,
we fooled the world;

we fooled ourselves.

We became draft dodgers
and activists,
poets and musicians,
stock brokers and analysts,
doctors and lawyers;

anything
but our mothers and fathers;

we became consumers,
we became users,
we became takers;

we became the future.

We consumed
until there was nothing
left to consume,
we took
until there was nothing
left to take,
we used up what belonged
to our children,
we spent the future
of our grandchildren,
but even that wasn’t enough,
we pointed our fingers,
we blamed the man,
we blamed the over thirty crowd,
only to realize
we had become the man;

we were the over
thirty crowd.

It was all about us,
the ‘me’ generation,
gods of our
own making;

we taught our
children well.
.
.