ESCAPING PUNISHMENT

To begin again, you should know

That this is going to hurt me

More than it hurts you.

Beware the folded belt,

Fear that your ass is about to get whooped,

And thank your lucky stars:

I'm not you-know-who next door;

She would make you go out back and cut a switch.

I will teach you yet to respect

This boy's life,

The blade of a knife...

[NOTE: Like so many, my younger brother and I were raised with these two forms of punishment: go to your room until we say you can come out, and, very rarely, actual corporal punishment - a spanking or the belt. This poem doesn't know whether or not I'm a better person for having that in my upbringing. (That said, mom and dad were not gratuitously punitive, and did not relish administering such remedies. Moreover, to their credit, Bill and Connie did nothing really cruel or unusual, like sending us to bed without dinner.) This is a confessional, in that a strict recollection is IMHO far healthier than silence or untruths on the topic. And yes, the second to last line refers to the emotionally dark movie from the 1990s that starred the late River Phoenix and Robert DeNiro, who plays the dubiously motivated, abusive stepfather.]