life – nor of the west

homespun

i wish you would be happy with what i am

but it’s hard for you
because i’m cut from a cloth you find difficult, stiff and scratchy

i’ve laid myself against the hot iron of your expectations
so often that i’m pliable beyond requirement
and even i’ve started to believe that your way of being, is better

i’m willing to adapt and i even see the benefits
of taking risks, dreaming big, of doing and being everything that my weavers never apparently contemplated

sadly an unplanned douse of cold, watery reality is all it takes to undo the careful treatments we’ve applied

and your ensuing disappointment is felt in every limp thread

i silently implode with anger and disgust
at the state of my development
over which i had no control
until such time as control became synonymous
with a near-complete rejection of
the values and approaches of the people
who gave me everything i needed
to get here

navigation

things never feel good unless they’re done right
and the alternative of not doing them
doesn’t actually exist

voyages are commenced more casually than perhaps they would be
if we knew just how many days we’d be at sea

there isn’t a whole lot of room for error
and somehow the course to chart is completely up to me

this is an impossible navigation
not least because the holes in my mind’s ship
are getting larger every day

i will keep sailing until whatever end;
i’m a survivor

but i’m not sure that i’ll ever have the option to thrive

rat race

i just want to be good at something
lose myself in something
choose myself for something

now i apply patches to holes that keep appearing in the roof
and i’m really good at keeping the place dry
but only because i’ve been able to move fast

there’s no furniture at home
but there are no puddles either

everything is clean and
non-existent

mindfulness

blue jellyfish in water — Photo by Diogo Brandao on Pexels.com

I’m using up all of my energy treading mind’s water,
afraid to sink below the surface even for a moment.

It’s not that I can’t hold my breath;
it’s that shutting my eyes and allowing the waves to take me under
will heighten my eternal senses,
my heart.

I’m avoiding being silent, avoiding it quite deliberately,
swimming from activity to caffeinated activity,
creating more reasons to stay here, afloat.

I’m afraid to know what’s down there

but more afraid that
despite my long-held belief that the darkness is also home to a sunken treasure,

there won’t be anything else at all there with me
and I’ll know that I am truly alone.

no vacancy

all the thoughts that have come before
have been my imperfect religion

there really isn’t room for
everything that once passed through my mind
to become a tenant now

you know that,
eviction won’t really be in the cards and we’ll have a whole host of other problems on our hands then

it won’t be the crowding —

it will be the breeding

bringing out mutants
whose only fault is their existence

spring

building with tree — Photo by James Wheeler on Pexels.com

when things are left alone long enough,
signs of new existence eventually seem to emerge
from the cracks

we’d like to say spring always finds a way;
that life has found a way

the only question is whether we think we are central
to the undeniable powers that flow
through, and which shape, the ages

all the existants that preceded us,
came from somewhere
and turned into someone too

stay home

photo of black sand beach — Photo by Marc-Antoine on Pexels.com

the worst place to be right now is inside my own head

it’s
not
very
nice
here

i’m not sure i ever want to be a leader
since i’m nowhere close to being a proper follower,
forgetting to stop at daily checkpoints in the face of
things that are seemingly so much more important

don’t try to pull me out now;
i only just managed to become comfortable with being alone

and alone is the place where i’ll stay,
home

the thing this crisis asks from us
is literally the hardest thing for me to give

un-bridled care, compassion,
making myself once again aware that

other

people

exist.

bounds

desert during nighttime — Photo by Walid Ahmad on Pexels.com

there are some people whose eyes tell you
that they desire more than where they find themselves

it feels nice to be understood by a lover
but you have to understand yourself more

exploring things about oneself
without breaking prior commitments is the challenge

who am i? is not the question i am asking

what are my bounds and limitations?

that’s more it

the thoughts we have and conceal
eat away inside leaving a most
dissatisfied kind of longing

space

at times i feel that my mind
has grown up faster than my circumstance

i don’t want to have outgrown you

i dont want to have come to the end of the page

i don’t think we are growing together as much as we are bumping into each other along the turbulent way up to space in a rocketship,
our trajectories together until we break out of the atmosphere

and then, no one really knows

i want to explore this wide open space of life

and maybe the only reason i need you is to have a place to come home

a relative to my changes,
a baseline

we should be able to get off this ride
when we want to, when it’s over

but i guess it
just
keeps
going

and part of me knows that the journey would be no different
had i started it with someone else by my side.

there is only so long you can stay wrapped up in a person
before the wool falls off your eyes
and your own self demands more from you than they ever could

so, this has been fun,
but, i have places i am trying to go

and i don’t think it makes sense for you to try to come along.

you’re on your own journey
and i’m sure we’ll meet up in a space cafe somewhere
to exchange stories and give nods of encouragement
before pushing off again
into our space

second generation

person holding clear glass ball — Photo by Nizam Abdul Latheef on Pexels.com

i can hold my own in a conversation not in my language
because i’ve learnt it, piecemeal, in response to demand

but wait – it could have been my language all along, right
and the fact that it isn’t
is the fault of experiences that even with good reason,
just don’t seem to quite line up

it’s amazing how wrong you can feel
about your life that is supposedly so right
and how you are a different person in each of your circles
so that no one will know the many ways in which you don’t fit in

it’s both maddening and heartbreaking to know
that you’ll never be good enough
for the people you supposedly resemble the most