A Tribute to Myself

This is my favorite poem!(May differ slightly from the original version.) Enjoy!

I have to live with myself and so I want to be fit for myself to know

I want to be able as days go by always to look myself straight in the eye

I don’t want to wake up with the setting sun, and hate myself for the things I’ve done

I don’t want to keep on a closet shelf, a lot of secrets about myself

And fool myself as I come and go into thinking that no one else would know
The kind of woman I really am, I don’t want to hold myself in sham

I want to go out with my head erect, I want to deserve all men’s respect

But here in the struggle for fame and pelf I want to be able to like myself
I don’t want to look at myself and know that I’m blunt and bluff and empty show
I could never hide myself from me; I see what others may never see

I know what others may never know I have to live with myself and so

Whatever happens I want to be, self respecting and conscience free.

~Edgar A. Guest