The Self Respect Deserved Poem by Paul Reason

I sit at my desk and the seat is cold The pain in my side makes me feel old The absence of movement makes me realize the load That I currently carry is pushing me into overload
I live life at breakneck speed Flying forward struggling to breath The mere sensation of a slowdown Is so unusual that is sends me to meltdown
Look at my life like a truck on the highway Onward forward doing things the right way Now as I fly down the road as I think The details of life are gone in an eye blink
I feel like a missile flying through the air Faster than the mind can think or care Then the slowdown hits and all that was shaken off Come back to my shoulders like a cape of cloth
My nights are filled with views of the past O the life, the fun, my goodness what a blast But these things that I did were only a mask The bad times and decisions still shroud my past
I could have done better there I have said it But my friends still try to give me credit Some say I was young it's what I was supposed to do But I say what happens when I'm young affects me when I'm older to
My reflections on my past have not been few Every night new thoughts and regrets come to But how long can a stay in this bridge of the truth? I see what is wrong and what is right to
Do I continue to let the past define me? Or let the fire of the present for the future refine me Am I worth saving? I hardly know When testing integrity they melt gold
Right now the past and the present meet And from those two the future I will greet But not as the boy the past and present know The future a new man will show


Those who knew the boy may like it or not But to this man his name is all he's got His name is a good one as of right now But in the future he will know how
To let not himself be seen in his life But the one who made him, earth, and life Pain is merely the melting pot of God To in the right way his people prod
The man stands tall at the feet of his master Equipped with the tools to make him last longer The new man is ready to serve He just had to die for the self-respect he deserved