Wandering Quixotic

Having reached that point
in a young poet's career
where I no longer wrote of torn hearts,
moved past cheap cutter portraits
and pounded the lid
back on that abused black paint,
I discovered the existential crisis:

If I am to better myself,
What, then should I write?

My first thoughts
were rather slow;
mistaking spinning wheels
for distance, I decided
I should write of my own life.

But the more I lived my life,
the less I desired it chronicled.
Besides that it's very boring
(unless you care for Navier-Stokes),
and if I really wanted it truthfully writ
I'd still be writing about Julie.
One plan shot down.

So I jotted down another sad one
about a guy who breaks a girl,
(for you don't give up your day job
'til you've found yourself another)
and set out hard for new ground.

Well then, I shall hoist
Uncle Sam's flag up my pen
and exhort in red, white and blue!
Give 'em hellfire and preach up a storm
and my rhetoric shall take no prisoners!
I'll map out for all those smarmy suits
the path to a Golden Age.
We'll change the world, you and I.

But then I realized
that it wouldn't surprise me
if I learned that the latest batch
of silver-spoon politicos
never bothered to learn to read.
God, it's tough to get excited about.

So I was stuck with the inexorable itch
to find myself a use
and a valiant cause,
that transcendent drive
preoccupying so many empty wanderers—

And as I stoked the fire, it consumed me.
I missed the forest for the trees,
or at least the blaze for the flames.
Engrossed in this epic task,
I forgot I was looking to be engrossed...
Finally it hit me.