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Advice To Young Men - I

I.
The world that you’re coming into
has never really cared
about who you are ‘deep inside,’
there is no money there.
Your teachers and parents praised you,
because that’s what they do,
the great weight of reality
was never told to you.
You’re unique, but not that special,
you must find skills of worth,
otherwise you’ll have a hard time
surviving on this earth.
t’s not because people hate you,
or that they ‘keep you down,’
ot’s because all are struggling,
all fear they soon will drown.

Don’t think that you can hit it big
With some real clever scheme,
trust me, it’s all been tried before,
get rich quick is a dream.
It’s hard work and tenacity,
real success comes from grit,
the pain of it beats weakness out,
you’ll be better for it.
If you don’t work, you will not eat,
that is the old cliché,
it’s true enough, but there’s much more
I think we have so say.
To not work and live on hand-outs
got from the government,
keeps you alive, but not much else,
it kills all moral sense.
All sense of your adulthood will
just wither on the vine,
you’ll always feel inadequate
in the back of your mind,
knowing you can’t sustain yourself,
that your own efforts fail,
that others must take care of you,
by them you must be bailed.
Either the shame grows in your heart,
and you feel pathetic,
or worse, you hide, and blame others
which just makes your soul sick.
You start to rag on those who work,
pretend they put you here,
ignore knowledge counter to this
in an eternal fear
that you might have to look and see
how your choice made this hell,
to hide from lacking dignity
tou tear them down as well,
And make all suffer what you do,
make all people live a bad life,
so you won’t have to feel the pain
of trying to live right.
What’s left will be a withered thing,
a ruined shell of man,
it’s best to realize starting off,
it’s best to understand
that men have to be productive,
that we were made to build,
best to work hard and start that cause,
before your soul grows ill.

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