A child rarely picks up a paintbrush and within seconds

produces something identical to the Mona Lisa.

Crisp papers and a pallet of colors

can only get someone so far.

in that we can agree.

So how come you expect olympians

out of the school children?

Babies are raised with high heels

and an I O U note

for the most successful future out there.

There is no childhood.

There is jr work squads and disciplinary actions

to straighten the backs into looking straight

ahead instead of into the skies.

Worries about numbers and letters that mark

and I.d. a permanent impression  

Prodigy they tell me

as if it was a synonym for Machiavellian or olympian

Childhood I respond

the absence is sending them to an early grave.