Persnickety
The persnickety little rules
which they teach in our grammar schools
are apt to lead us all astray
as things to live by day to day.
In our quite quotidian lives
the realization arrives
they teach us what, now how, to think.
All of these restrictive rules stink.
In our pseudo democracy
we have this myth that we are free.
We heretics and rebels see
our teachers as persnickety.
Freedom is always dangerous
from which they are protecting us.

Walt Abbott–10-17-08