An Old Poet Counts To One Hundred Percent

You miss one hundred percent
of the shots you don’t take,
read the poster
on my former manager’s wall.

It should have read, “You miss
one hundred percent of the shots
I forbid you to take,
and one hundred percent of the shots
you take without asking me first.
Then again, it’s better to ask for forgiveness
than permission — but do both
at once one hundred percent of the time.”

Fifty percent of the reason
I quit that damn job was
that damn poster, and the other
fifty percent was how sick I was 
of the damn cafeteria. How I could never
eat my lunch in peace. How no lunch
was ever one hundred percent 
free of work, network, busy work…

no matter. I do not miss
one hundred percent
of what I stepped away from. I take
one hundred percent of the shots now.
I miss a less than exact percentage.

Let’s not, in fact, admit to there being
percentages at all for missing and taking now.
I take a tree, I miss a stone.
I miss falling, I take flight.

I took my shot. I took 
my missing it as an immeasurable ocean
upon which to set sail.