My Will

Who I am to the world rests really on my will.

My hands can kiss the page, or they can kill,

Or worst and more disappointing still

I can avert my hands and, unoffending, watch my words,

Get my boxer-briefs in a bunch over double standards.

If I worked up the will to be an A student,

The only matter would be A work, and I would do it,

Speed my way toward teaching, or if that proves uninviting,

Use the same degree, consider a job in lucrative test-writing,

Or I could drop out and instead chase publication,

Bound by bread to compromise and supplication

As a struggling poet and novelist.

I could drop out and work outside the word and all this.

Or, tonight, I could choose not to exist.

Each moment is a hydra-facèd precipice.

I think I won't, but should any such questions persist,

I'll be a procrastinator. I think tonight

I'll just be a Sherlockian who's getting his head right.