Mudguard

Today we have the filling of forms:
Who are you? How do we know you are
You? What do you want from us? How much?
Why should we give anything to you?
What should persuade us? Are you worth it?
The poetry of shared suspicion,
The literature of applying
To applications. Are you worthy?
Look at me, but you cannot see me!

My name is Formless. I have a shape,
But I am not the shape you can see.
I am a past. I'm everything passed.
I am the past that's always changing.
Chase me through the forms I've filled for you.
Chase me through forms you've filled for others.
That's the way the literate do it,
But don't lay it on the bureaucrats.
The stalkers at campfires started it.

There was, somewhere, the original
"Halt! Who goes there?" The first use of words
To demarcate worthy and worthless.
What a notion! Worth! What are you to us?
What are we to ourselves, to the world?
Everything. Not much. Have you ever
Backed an old truck into a ditch,
Ground your way out, and lost a mudguard?
Filed a form? No? Good. That's the password.