Homo Mediocritus Poem by Richard Randolph

History is but a jumble of names and dates,
but it happened so long ago
what difference does it make?
I believe in living in the moment.
That's why I love music so much.
It's about real people like me.
And that's why I love to sing,
particularly sad love songs.
Okay, I know I'm not good technically,
but I really feel what I'm singing,
because I'm really sensitive,
and that's the main thing.
That's why my feelings get hurt sometimes,
particularly when people think they're so smart
and are condescending or mean.
That's one reason school was so hard.
The teachers thought they were so smart,
always correcting every single thing I did,
and math was just one problem after another.
Science class was sometimes interesting,
but they were always challenging my religion
and some people just like to hear themselves talk.
But English class was the worst.
All those stupid books they try to make you read.
I read one once, and it was really boring,
about a bunch of people I don't even know.
School's just not for me, I guess.
I'm more of a people person.
I wish I could speak about a hundred languages
and just travel around talking to different kinds of people.
But just knowing one language is hard enough,
what with all the words meaning five different things,
and then the spelling and punctuation.
None of it makes any sense.
I sometimes try to write things, though,
you know, my thoughts and feelings,
really deep stuff, too, sometimes,
but it just never seems to come out right,
which is too bad because I'm actually quite smart.
Okay, maybe not book smart exactly,
but, well, for whatever reason,
I just know what I know.