Want Not Want

I want starts early in life.
Think about the many wants you've had.
When did you first hear or know
Your wants are unbounded? Limitless?

Did your mind acknowledge this information
And proceed to want more and more?
Have you reached the level of wanting
Peace on earth? No Nukes? Equal Rights?

When did you turn the corner
On wanting and getting?

Remember the feelings, the power, the ingenuity
Of turning a potential into a reality?
An opportunity into a business?
An idea into a machine? An organization?
A performance? Or a poem?

I want to do this
And now it is done!
Wow! Golly Gee!

If I want it badly enough
I can make it happen.
Sadat, Begin, and Carter
Want peace in the Middle East.

How can peace be realized
With Arafat, Brezhnev, and Komeini?

Somehow it does not flow.
Remove the obstacles!
Make way for peace!
Whose will be done?

Will you give your life
For love or money, peace or what?
What do you want badly enough?
I wonder what Elvis wanted at last?

What strange twists of mind
Convince us of our lot in life?
Wanting. Getting. Giving way.
Wanting. Getting. Giving way.
Life seems to be a cycle
Of spiraling wants.

What does God want anyway?
Love and adoration
Seem rather juvenile from here.
How about equality
And justice for all?

No test of wills with me dear God.
Count me one among the grains of sand.
Free will firm in hand
I want to ride, not fight the wind.

I want not want,
But have want nonetheless.