The Measure of a Man

You must have read some novel once, got caught up in some fantasy
And I can tell you’re thinking life should somehow be that way
Where there’s some valiant prince, so handsome, there to grace your every sunset
With his elegant bravado swaying maidens by the way

And I can see you’re disappointed
I guess I just don’t understand
What it is that you believe
Marks the measure of a man

Once I loved a princess from an island south of nowhere
And we wrapped around each other like the stars around the sky
And once in every little while now, I can still remember
How we loved as though we’d never lose and sometimes, I still cry

And you just tell me I’m a baby
I guess I just don’t understand
What it is that you believe
Marks the measure of a man

And once upon a younger time, you were enamored by ideals
But then you got so jaded when you lost your case upon appeals
And all those knights in gilded armor with their countenance of stone
There’s never been enough to go around, and so you choose to be alone

I’ll light a candle in the desert
And pray you someday understand
That it’s the heart that really matters, baby
And that’s the measure of a man

-K Marlo Yost, 12/5/2019