poem
Volume 31, Number 3

Self-Made Man

I was raised by wolves who gave me just enough to survive.
I am the über autodidact:
I built the school where I taught myself
economics, built a factory—and the roads
leading to the factory—where I alone
made my fortune. I am a self-made man.

When my factory caught fire, I put it out myself.
I hire the police that protect my home from the hordes
that would tax me: I need nothing from the state, and so
give nothing to the state.

After I die, my employees, and the countless
recipients of my charity,
will bemoan that they aren’t also self-made;
they will accept their poverty and continue to work for
and admire my son,
whom I have raised like a wolf to be a self-made man,
to carry on my legacy.


—Andy Posner