What Good Thing Must I Do?
I wish it was fulfilling
And impelling
And possible
To do all that Good requires of me
And I wish that satisfying its demands
Could sustain me
In perpetual Goodness
Doing Good
Looking Good
Being Good
Feeling Good
Its peak beckons a summit
Like a beguiling mirage
Just beyond the contemptuous terrain
To savor it
Like a glorious tonic
Is to carve space
For future disappointment
And to become short-lived
In kind
I’d rather clamor
Toward something else–
Something that doesn’t make me feel
Like I should defend
Or apologize for the fact
That I am not quite enough–
Something which didn’t exhaust
Simply by the presence
Of its impossible demands
But I can’t see beyond Good
Which, I suspect, separates me
From actual contentment
If only I could find the limitations
And boundaries
Of Good
Which imprison
And dictate
And deplete
Such a cruel dictator
Clothed as Light, itself
But oh, the torment it deals
If its expectations are not met
And the secondary
And tertiary yields
Of further torment
Leaving behind only
Bruised
Or becoming
Selfdoms
As proof of its
Oppressive
Enveloping
Discriminating
Distorting
Reign
