Accepted

these days when
meeting someone new
I don’t immediately
assume that they will
dislike me on sight.

when I look back
I realise that apart from
having learned to concentrate
my lifelong rage against the
oil-slicked, flithy machine
in an appropriate manner,
I have changed little
since I was a child, and yet
in those distant days
though I wore the right clothes
all my peers saw was disguise

now I am accepted and
even respected

I believe it is because
while I have stood still,
they’ve aged into
my way of thinking

maybe I have always
been old

or maybe my parents
were too wise to teach me any
of the false lessons we have to forget
in order to be decent

© Jane Paterson Basil