I know what some of you are thinking:
'Another liberal with his plea
For smoking bloody pot to be
  Decriminalised.'

But you'd be wrong. For stumbling through
My hoard of words I sometimes think
Of meanings that may interlink
With origins now nullified.

Long ago in Latin class
When asked to analyse one word
(And woe betide us if we erred)
  We'd freeze quite petrified.

Eventually the teacher would
Himself be forced to explicate
What we had failed to penetrate,
  However much we tried.

Who needs a scholar now to teach
Us what 'sub' means? And though 'stance'
Is not obscure, the dual dance
  May leave one mystified

Leaving aside the usual definition
Of substance, down that road I will not blunder
But take its Latin sense of standing under
  With all that is implied.

Accepting this, I need to change
'Controlled' into 'controlling,' though
What I do and who I am I owe
to substance — still unspecified.