Stepping up to you.

I was special, a lucky omen.
My birth coincided with your rise.
I grew with the all the love.
Straight were your deeds and words.
An honesty and integrity
never equaled.
You taught me not to lie,
not to be afraid
when there is nothing to hide.
The honor of life.
The unwritten code.

With the power of words
and the power of the past,
you rose.
Hard work and confidence.
A born salesman.
Too many people believed you.
Luxury and carelessness came in.
Values and honesty went out.

Fall from the pedestal was hard.
All of us went down with you.
The right and the wrong,
Not through your words
but your life.
Spectacularly close to success,
but excruciatingly far.
Your ways didn't change.
The hypocrisy was too much
for me to ignore.

Living a king's life
when you had nothing
that you own.
Majesty which comes from the stride,
not the money.

Always young and open
to learn new life.
A wonderful, restless, beautiful, contrived,
intelligent and clever mind that you had
which you wasted on a life
that could have been bigger and better.
And who am I to judge?

Can I ever step into those big shoes,
see the things you saw
and do the things you did
and still not give up on the face
of an epic failure?
Regardless of what becomes of me,
a lesson was there to be learned.
My life would be an answer to yours.
And mine would be a question
which would be judged and answered by time.