...of care.

Why didn’t they allow the boy to run free?

It would have prevented him from running wild

and having to lie about where he’d been

or where he hadn’t gone, but should have.

Life soon became a concoction of fiction

and then feeling guilty because of the lies.

He began to preempt the questions they'd ask

he had a series of well rehearsed lies to call upon

He also had a burden of guilt that got heavier

and eventually became unbearable. 

He wasn’t aware of the destructive nature of guilt 

so why did he hide from the prosecution of his guilt

and the reality of the constraints they’d placed upon him?

What would people think? they asked.

What would people say? they queried.

As they fed the guilt...

 

"I don’t care", he’d cry and this was truth.

He wouldn’t care, because he couldn’t care,

because he was a stranger to the warm, nurturing effects of care.