You Will

You will wonder how this can be the world

You will believe in elaborate lies with perfect sincerity

Your dutiful patience will be a fat vein for hungry teeth

You will endure ruthless exploitation, for modest compensation, without complaint

You will carry exhaustion through insipid repetition

You will grind your teeth to powder and bite your eloquent tongue raw

Your dreams and aspirations will writhe in the shadow of your results

You will recognize the worst of possibilities as the only one that will fit you

You will ask your body to explain itself and be blithely ignored

You will build a small world on ideas that melt into parodies

Your favorite star by which to navigate will turn out not to be a star at all

You will discover that the fulcrum of your cosmos is a device

You will see that it is no natural light, but a counterfeit radiance

Your friends will prove to be unworthy of the name, or you will

Your yes and amen will wriggle into negation and disintegration

You will endure

You will look into the warm, dark eyes of your steed

You will know that this strong animal is a supple synonym for speed

You will borrow some of that muscled, obstinate grace

You will hone the sword of your clear and certain mind

You will inscribe your impregnable convictions into its hilt

You will don your armor and your helmet

You will repeat their secret names, softly

You will look through the trees, at the monsters with their scornful laughter

You will see their ill will, their eyes that drip shame and disappointment

You will watch their ragged claws hunger for the vestiges of your dignity

You will tremble, for a moment, as they gather like skeptical questions at the altar

You will find yourself trusting a fresh horse more than you trust time

You will rush, joy cascading through your cells, at the school of demons in your way

You will best them all

You will know them for the bastards of fear and doubt

You will understand that nightmares were not born and cannot, really die

You will shout a thousand, courageous truths into their carnival ears

You will watch your horse embarrass them with its calm goodness

You will count their ludicrous heads as they roll into the dust

You will heed the alarm you struggled to set

You will wash to make way for new dirt

You will haul your disobedient flesh into your bored attire

You will do the work you no longer understand or believe in

You will eat the meals and scrub the means by which you made them

You will recite the hollow greetings and farewells

You will surrender to the sheets, and you will dream again

You will vanquish hordes of horrible things

You will feel your horse take pride in what you have done, together

You will know that you are undefeated, and beautiful, for another day