A Pound of Flesh

Tomorrow I will treat myself
As something lesser than I can be;
I will punish my appearance
For my undesirability,
And I will go about my business
As a wasted commodity.

Tomorrow I’ll agree with you
About my insufficient claim
I’ll stay silent because I know
I’ve no right to change the game;
I’m an unwanted anomaly
In the world of All The Same.

Tomorrow I’ll use what bits I have
To feed the shallow illusion
I will grovel for forgiveness
For being a poor substitution
I will accept my surface
Necessitates my exclusion,

Tomorrow I will crawl about
The rotten crust on which I’m born,
I will discount my existence
For the crime of being shopworn
After you drank my youth,
I learned to swallow my scorn.

And tomorrow I will drink it down,
And tomorrow I will judge my skin,
And tomorrow you will take the blade
Forged every generation
And exact the pound from all of us
Because you’re hungry again

But tonight I’m angry with you
For a lifetime of distraction,
For a woman’s only strength
Being the strength of her attraction-
Because your every passing desire
Is another pound’s extraction

In every passing generation,
Ad nauseam, with no drop of compassion.