farmboy's hall of blame

I know you all came here to be entertained
you want laughter and tears and expensive champagne
I know I shouldn't be self indulgent 
I'm ashamed
but please enter and visit my hall of blame

first, I blame the schools
for doing me completely wrong
your contribution to my isolation
discouraging my song
for the ways that you ignored me
and taught me to obey
as well as fearing anybody
old enough for the PTA

second: the adults who decided
I was not worth talking to
and further in
and further in
and further I withdrew
till there was just imagination
coming in to replace
the spaces where adults should have been
my childhood erased

third: welcome to my catalogue of
various mental illnesses
my history of taking but not knowing
just what pill this is
I don't know if I'm the thief
or one of many witnesses
but I keep going down, down, down
what a never ending pit this is
what a never ending pit this is

fourth: to my body
that I never really got to know
ruled by my pal asthma
and the lengths it would go
to make sure I couldn't move
and that I always fell behind
wearing my mental illness
disguised as fat on the outside

fifth: that would be my memories
who hold me hostage and desert me
and remembers everything
about everyone who ever hurt me
and of all the wrongs I've ever done
the guilt will never leave me
and the judgements of everyone 
who would never really see me

speaking of guilt...

six: the Catholic Church
that taught a wretch like me
the rituals that fit so well
with my spiritual OCD
maybe you also encouraged
the need to be somebody else
by condemning me to a future
of always doubting myself

number seven: the times then
were backwards as could be
holding on to standards
labeled 1953
you hit them and you scold them
and make sure they stay in line
and then sit back and watch
the unraveling of thier minds

to be continued... maybe...