Here's another mythology poem. A couple of the phrases that are echoed and altered in it may be unfamiliar to foreign readers. "Don't ask, don't tell" was a policy in the American military forbidding anyone from asking if a solidier was gay but also forbidding gay soldier from coming out and declaring their sexuality. "It's eleven o'clock. Do you know where your children are?" (or some slight variation) was a common public service reminder on TV promoting parental responsibility.
The Oracle
I am anything but enigmatic.
It is you who turn my plain truth
into twisted riddles through your
reluctance to face what you request.
Don’t ask and I won’t tell
what you do and don’t want to hear.
And why do you want to know your fate,
when it’s the one thing you cannot fight?
My supposed ambiguity is merely your attempt
to deny the undeniable, to avoid
the unavoidable, to forget you found
out what you should never know.
But still you insist on asking for
then ignoring my warnings,
rejecting my edicts,
defying my decrees
until they come to pass.
It’s eleven o’clock, Oedipus,
do you know who your parents are?
The Oracle
I am anything but enigmatic.
It is you who turn my plain truth
into twisted riddles through your
reluctance to face what you request.
Don’t ask and I won’t tell
what you do and don’t want to hear.
And why do you want to know your fate,
when it’s the one thing you cannot fight?
My supposed ambiguity is merely your attempt
to deny the undeniable, to avoid
the unavoidable, to forget you found
out what you should never know.
But still you insist on asking for
then ignoring my warnings,
rejecting my edicts,
defying my decrees
until they come to pass.
It’s eleven o’clock, Oedipus,
do you know who your parents are?
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