Micah Moore: Jill pleads with Jack at the top of the hill

Carry for me, Jack, this pail of water.
In the classic tune they tell, you fall.
Not today, Jack. Come, the day gets hotter
as we wait and, listen, the hill calls
us downward. Every time they say you stumble,
I clumsily am trailing in your wake,
slipping as the rocks beneath us crumble
into laughter. Can you hear them make
a mockery of us, Jack? Steady, now.
Step as if you hate the story told,
the way we toil just to fail and how
the bucket that could quench our thirst is sold
for nothing as they leave you empty-handed
and bandaged. Change it, Jack! I just can’t stand it!