Long-haired and skinny,
I return to the fancy hotel
with five hundred silver coins,
a present from the president.
I feel as fortunate and overwhelmed
as a poor shepherd boy in a fairy tale,
but in those stories there is always a set
of three impossible tasks.
So what will the president demand
in return—verses in his honor?
What if I fail?
This isn’t a magical world.
The tests will be challenges
to my character, not spells
cast by witches.