i keep slipping. in my mind and on the page and on the pavement beneath my feet. there are no 10 steps to a perfect life. the steps are countless. infinite. and it is so difficult to take each one with perfect precision. or good. or even half-decent. maybe my shoes are too big or my knees are too weak, but, either way, walking has become increasingly more difficult nowadays.
i keep slipping. allow me to elaborate with a couple more metaphors that won't really make sense. i am not making this easy to understand, i know, but god didn't make life easy to traverse, so why's all the pressure on me to make things easy for you? i want you to love me and know me through my poetry, but does that only make me a metaphor of a man that no one can understand? i keep slipping. but the funny thing is, i am not even running. or walking. i am merely crawling through mondays in search of friday nights. is that all that i've become? i remember running through the lawn on summer afternoons. i remember ice cream parties in my pajamas. i remember a day when i didn't wear a watch around my wrist and i didn't have a phone in my pocket to remind me that i am always late and missing out on everything life has to offer me. i keep slipping. on my words and on my plans and on my promises. i reach out my hand, but there is no one around. so i push down on the ground and rise up without a sound. it is dark, yet the light is so blinding. i am choking on my senses. i am drowning in expectations handed down to me by only myself. i keep slipping. she is lying in bed and staring at me, wondering what thoughts are racing through my mind. but the only words i can find are words that are searching for better words. she needs me at this moment, but i feel the bed expanding and her and i growing further and further apart. there is a wall in the middle of the bed disguised as a pillow. she rolls over. maybe then she can finally get some answers. i keep slipping. and i swear to god these cubicle walls keep shrinking! mr. bossman, i ask you again, when will this paperwork ever end? he just smiles and hands me another folder. i lose myself more and more ever-so-slightly with each form i fill out and each day my time card tells me when i can and when i cannot eat my peanut butter sandwich. i keep slipping. in and out of sleep. i see a man in the mirror, but i swear that man isn’t me. he may look like me, but there are scars on his soul that i refuse to claim. goddammit, i seem again to be out of whiskey. maybe this time i will take a beer. or a pill. or anything to help me fall asleep once again. i keep slipping. there is darkness. i hear a million whispers that when combined can be deafening. i try listening to one voice at a time, but each voice keeps getting lost to another and none of their words are distinguishable though i can hear the anguish and disappointment in their tones. then the whispers turn to shouting and the shouting turns to me alone in a dark room. where silence becomes the most deafening thing i have ever heard. i keep slipping. while everyone around me moves forward with ease. briefcases and backpacks. diamond rings and diaper bags. wallets that form a bulge in their back pocket. cars that go vroom! and watches that glimmer in the sunlight. me? i am once more lying on the floor, attempting to stand back up. i keep slipping. i crawl up to the door of god and attempt to knock, but there is no sound. i bang my fists as hard as i can against the wooden door. i stand and kick and fall with a loud thud! but the door remains silent. i try to listen for the shuffling of feet, for the unlocking of chains, for the voice of god. but there is nothing but silence. i keep slipping. and you keep flipping through the pages hoping that this will all eventually make sense. but it won’t. this poem will just end with disappointment. all these words are just metaphors for a life that you will never understand. and i am just a metaphor of a man. i keep slipping. |
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