Asinine phrases spill out My speech banal and my audience bored All of the attention and glamor I fail to hoard “Does anyone care what I have to say?”
Yet they had listened with attentive ears When a fellow partygoer had to interject Saying I had a detail incorrect, no disrespect “Doesn’t anyone believe me!”
My articulation had stayed its welcome And yet kept spilling out at full blast It seemed time to pull my head from my ass Why don’t I listen to anyone?
Introspection is good, ego a bit worse But I must get out of my own head And listen to others’ adventures they lead How do I show that I’m attentively listening?
Rays of light And roses of white A bumblebee takes flight Such a wonderful sight
The earth cool and wet I bury the seed Waiting a few sunsets On fresh lettuce I will feed
Plummeting droplets Wet the soil and the roots Moisture and sun let My roses rise and roost
Creating life from soil and light Makes for such a humbling sight Harvesting basil and thinking I may Grow parsley next season, peppers or maize
As the morning mist delicately peppers my face, I wonder how I got to this point. The gray clouds mosey across the melancholic sky, blotting out the sunlight. A grouping of birds soar across the sky, flying southward away from this increasingly chilly landscape. A strong gust of wind catches me by surprise, reddening my ears and nose from the cold. A gray morning for a gray life.
See, here I was thinking I had a chance with a woman. Foolish, I know. The day we met was a beautiful day. An orange sunset painted the sky blue, red and lavender. I stood outside the local watering hole, feeling the cool inhale of a menthol cigarette. As I exhaled the minty vapors, I saw her for the first time. I’m not sure what overtook me, perhaps the devil on my shoulder, perhaps the angel. Whomever it was, I decided to approach her, such a far cry from my shy, lonesome self.
I would describe her, but see it doesn’t really matter, because now she’s gone. But she was beautiful nonetheless, picture her as your ideal woman, in body and personality.
“You look like you’ve had a long day, care for a smoke?”
“Sure have and I sure will, thanks! What’s your name generous stranger?”
And that’s how we first met. And my god did I fall hard and fast for her. Of course everyone knows the stereotypes of what guys think about, but I truly fell in love with her mind. The more and more we talked it seemed we saw the world through the same lenses, the same hopes and dreams. I thought we would both paint our brushstrokes on a shared canvas called life. It turned out we wouldn’t even have a sketch.
At this point we had been friends for a few months. I knew I had to make my move soon, so I asked her out on a proper date. Not just down to the bar this time, we went to the restaurant that serves mussels as an appetizer and dirty martinis from the bar. So the night ended and I asked her to be my girlfriend. I thought she felt the same way about me that I did about her.
“No, I’m sorry but I just don’t see us that way.”
“What do you mean, we are almost the same person we can relate to each other so well.”
“You’d have to be an absolute fool to believe that!”
And so she stormed off in a rage with myself in a flustered state. I guess she was right.
That’s why it’s appropriate that it’s a gray morning I guess. Pretty foolish to think it would be any other kind of day today. Pretty foolish to think that it would be warm, with the sun shining and the birds singing instead of fleeing.
Although I know I won’t see her again, she did teach me one very important lesson.
I am a fool.
“It’s a shame you must go” Is what I said to her But in my heart I know She should stay away for sure
Approaching the door Then the knob turns Hope to never see her no more Or she spontaneously combusts and burns
I’m giddy and eager For this woman to leave Her love was meager And her lies she would weave
Yet I keep a smile My face is filled with joy Hope she walks a mile Over plastic Lego toys
“And that’s how you organize a marketing campaign” She said as her fingers ran through her luscious mane As she pressed the black marker to her lips I was daydreaming that it was my fingertips
Five minutes later, she called on me to answer A question unknown, as I imagined her a dancer And completely zoned out and failed to pay attention She got so mad, yet it only grew my attraction
How could I stay focused when she looked so fine These adverts and promotions lie in the back of my mind I wanted her as badly as I wanted to pass With both equally unlikely, I was failing the class
Her intelligence was hot, as was her hourglass figure With ample time on Earth to grow smarter and sweeter While I was an awkward undergrad, new to adulthood I wanted to ask her out, yet I never would
Because she must have a husband, or a harem of men Her body and mind a most seductive blend The more I reflected, the lower my mood She was perfect, I shared a shower with forty dudes
And so my mind wandered and wandered until the end of the lecture And snapped out of a daydream of exploring her most wonderful architecture But there’s no reason to have false hope, to follow or lurk It was time to return to the dorms, and do my homework
Muddled thoughts make for muddled mind Surety and certainty are long left behind Surrounded by phantoms of folks I once knew My heart is no longer honest or true
I remember before my heart became asunder As a child this world seemed a such wonder But the waters of life erode bit by bit Wearing away a once indomitable spirit
It’s easy to lose yourself, to lose true north When your passions fail to come forth Your friends move on, your family passes Sometimes it seems that nothing good lasts
So now you’re alone in the vastness of it all Surviving now seems an order so tall When you start to find your own mind unjust One must wonder who’s left to trust
I am lost. So lost. The chilling cold surrounds me from all sides, suffocating me with it’s frosty force and icy intensity. I have lost my ability to see, to hear, to even walk properly. I need your help.
You know what to do, right? You survived this. How anyone could I’m not sure. My fingers are frost bitten, my eyes snow blinded, my heart colder than the air surrounding it. How did I get here I’m not sure. But I need your help.
Please give me courage, kind words, hope to escape this desolate nightmare. I must find my way back to my friends, family, and to my own foundation. I walked too far from the beaten path and have now been beaten down myself. To find my way back I’ll need your help.
I know you can’t touch me, but can you touch my heart. Let me know that this is not all my fault, that the blame is not all mine to bear. I need to know that I am good, that I am worthwhile, and that I can escape from this hell. You’re just like me, and walked the same path not too long ago, and look at you now. Free from danger, free from fear, and free from the icy torrent of your own heart. Since you’re just like me, surely I can do it too? But I cannot muster the strength by myself, so I need your help.
I just need one person to believe in me. To believe that I am good. To believe that my life is special and worth living. To believe that this winter will subside into a blossoming springtime. To believe that all can and will be okay. For that I need help.
Of course I will help you, for you are myself! Fear not, me, for this winter shall pass, the frost will melt and the flowers will bloom. I know it’s hard to keep hope during life’s darkest and coldest season, yet fear not, for I am here to help!
You are good, worthwhile, special and lovable. You are important , caring and intelligent. But it’s impossible to see yourself when the ice has surrounded your heart, the frost has surrounded your mind and the blizzard deafens your ears and blinds your eyes. Just keep walking, you must keep walking at any cost, for stopping surely means your death. The end of the road may be obscured, but you must follow the little white line on it’s side, and keep following until you’re safe. Keep walking, please keep walking.
When you finally arrive the flowers will be in bloom, the snow melted away and the birds returned from their southern exodus. Your mind will clear, your eyes will see, and your heart will love once again. How do I know these things? It is because I journeyed down the same road you currently traverse, the same mistakes you’ve stumbled into and the same felt the same hate you currently feel. But you will survive, damn it you will do even better than that. You will thrive. But only if you keep walking. Never stop walking.
A distant light in the dark sky A place immeasurably distant Who must live there, how and why I close my eyes and transport in an instant
Trees in the sky, clouds on the ground An exotic bug stumbles through a river Purple liquid flowing all around The excitement just makes me shiver
A distant call from a foreign bird Flapping four wings with ferocious speed Some bipedal horses herd Chewing on red grass and yellow weed
Finally I see a four legged creature Using a harness to climb a tree An incredible mind, an intelligent feature And now he’s looking up at the sky back at me
Left swipe. Left swipe. Left swipe. So many women obsessed with drinking and so called hiking, where is an original person? Hang on… who is she? Wow she is stunning, long black hair, piercing green eyes, and is that a bottle in her hand. God no please not another drinker. Hang on, why is there a cloth hanging out of the bottle, surely that can’t be a Molotov cocktail? Next picture, she’s standing next to the local courthouse, maybe she was just downtown with friends or something. But her bio says that she wants to “Destroy the engine of capitalism at any cost.”
This stranger slowly begins to look more and more familiar as a flick through her pictures. Have I seen this face before? I click on my news app and scroll through the headlines, until I stop. It’s her, under an article reading “Philadelphia woman wanted for arson, mass murder after courthouse bombing.” I remember now, the courthouse she was standing in front of in her photo was also her target. Holy shit. A mass bombing perpetrator, the most wanted person in the entire nation right now, and I just matched her on Tinder. So naturally I swiped right….
The desire to run was lost. The ability to run was lost. The will to live was lost. This is how Jeremy felt when the doctor told him that due to his chronic illness he would never run again. Dreams of state championships crushed. But less superficially than titles and trophies, Jeremy’s soul felt crushed. The freedom of barreling down the open road, legs moving and wind blowing through his hair. What now he thought. What now.
