Its cost

* * its cost * *
Soft butter leather
Well used and carefully kept
Your satchel is reminiscent
Of one less expensive you carried
When you were young and carefree
A youth with ideals intact
A naivety almost offensive
To how world was and is
You carry the satchel to try
And recapture essence of that time
The bubbling creativity
The winning without loss
The feeling all can be conquered
Such wells of strength from which to draw
Not realising not only the world
But smallest of their minds
Against which you had to war
Their thoughts were placed differently
Their pace was set so much slower
Could not understand your urgency
Indeed you cannot understand it now yourself
As if to drive the coach of your ideas all the faster
Would make it achieve where all others had blundered
When in fact the end was already preordained
A job slightly comfortable
Ambition without insight
A gradual move across
To the slowly plodding tracks
Of the carthorse not the race
A little grey in your hair
A satchel in your lap
Reminding you of other days
Hinting at the once was brilliant
The person who you was
Not needing symbols to demonstrate
Who you wanted to be
No need for satchel or pen
Your heart and voice proclaimed
The thunder in your passion
Drive in your life
And now there is just your smile
Amused and wiser and wired
To a greater understanding
All poets cannot write poetry
All philosophers are not heard
And a mortgage needs paying
A comfortable life has its cost.