Poem: This Is The Same As What Has Failed Before

This Is The Same As What Has Failed Before

I do not think any of this is real
or what you have offered me so far
is anything new or different.

I am still trying, am still here,
but I do not trust these things.
You want my trust, I know,
I realize it is important to you.

I wonder why you want it so much.
Is it part of a trick?  You still claim
this is new and different, is better
than other options.  But how?
I do not believe you,

I know this is nothing new.  I have
experience.  I have heard each of these things,
have known it all for a long time,
it is decades ago already
since I first heard these ideas,
and not just the ideas,
but the same terms for them.

You understand the problem, I hope,
the issue that is arising.  I know
it is not new, but you insist
that I must accept it as different.
How can that be anything good?
I cannot trust you
if you do not accept
what is true in my experience.

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