Gotcha! Poem by Michael Patrick King

What is a conscience
If not a companion
Who whispers into your ear
Unfettered syllables
To arouse your suspicions
Or bound ones to heighten your fears?

I have a conscience
Don't say it's not so
A spirit attends me each hour
That I spend online
To hoodwink unsuspecting
Fools to succumb to my power

When I would show mercy
My conscience says 'Never
Cut a dimwitted mark any slack;
Keep the phones ringing
Whatever the ploy
To keep our accounts in the black.'

E'en when I sleep
He gives me no peace
He goads me to dream up new ways
To advertise nostrums
That nobody needs
Or whatever, so long as it pays

Do you suppose
That your Holy Spirit
And 'conscience' are one and the same?
Or maybe you think
That the monsters who prey
Upon children are playing a game

We all have our consciences
You, I and they
We listen to voices, it's true
The sane, the insane
The well and the wicked
Have consciences, just as do you