It is generating more attention
lately –
The Smile.
It feels as if an urgent message
from The Universe,
a response to a long-forgotten prayer,
a desperate cry uttered
while in the midst of The Abyss.
“Re-member what you are,”
The Universe whispers
delicately in the ear.
With each compliment of
The Smile,
a call for immediate re-alignment
of consciousness.
LIFE
can seem insane.
So many of us are unable
to withstand its pain.
We do our best to live,
to contribute
to a world
constantly changing
and maddening.
Still, through it all
some of us manage not to fall.
Like a seedling
making its way up through concrete,
we spread our wings,
we plant our feet.
We’ve found our place;
we are lauded and celebrated.
But then-
in the blink of an eye,
an “apparent suicide“.
What happened?!
What went wrong?!
Does not success
bring with it sustained happiness?
What of us
for whom no one makes a fuss,
who daily squeeze into an overcrowded bus
to a job that leaves us empty and numb?
If the “extra-ordinary” so regularly succumb,
how then does the “ordinary” overcome?
“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation…” Henry David Thoreau, Walden
I will need to change my life
in order to save it.
This I am feeling to my very core.
Don’t know how much more
I can swallow.
I’m walkin’ on thin ice,
on troubled waters that are shallow.
Born an introvert, Quiet is the air I must breathe,
what sustains and maintains me.
Without adequate doses of silence,
I lose pieces,
become untethered,
cannot see a hopeful reality,
begin to question my existence
and that of all humanity.
Why all the noise –
the incessant chatter and mindless banter?
“Y’all gonna make me lose my mind
up in here, up in here.
Y’all gonna make me lose control
up in here, up in here.”
I will need to change my life
in order to save it.
Deprived of silence,
I feel my blood boiling,
heart racing,
hands tremblin’,
mind slipping.
I can taste that bitter, flimsy line
between love and hate;
that soft, raw space
where even the gentlest among us
can suddenly snap
and do things we can never take back.
The Devil isn’t over there-
No, it plays in us all
bidding we follow
and fall-
fall so hard and low,
we can barely stand up.
I will need to change my life,
re-claim it
in order to save it.
Exactly how to do so
overwhelms and scares –
the tide is seemingly so high.
Got to go deep inside,
to The Core
lean only on that which is Truth and pure.
I had plans
today.
Plans for adventure
and duty-
all
entailed
The Commute
to The City
on the weekend
when all Hell is loosed
and The Commute
becomes an Intolerable Beast,
affecting me
everywhere –
from head
down to feet!
The relentless rush,
the multitudes of people,
trains disabled.
The smell of urine
and rotten cheese
emanating from homeless humans
with limbs grotesquely diseased-
scratching, sleeping
begging, hustling.
And then
there’s The Noise–
my God –
crashing
repeatedly
angrily
forcefully
into me,
engulfing me
like a seismic sea wave,
driving me crazy,
utterly insane!
I must go deep
inside–
retreat,
hide-
do whatever it takes
to survive
The Commute’s
overwhelming
and exhausting
stimuli
I so desperately hate.
I was not built for this–
no, not me
the sensitive introvert
who thrives
only
in relative silence;
who loves
longs for
peace and quiet.
The older I get
the more intense
is the stress
that The Commute
elicits.
As my threshold
for tolerance
rapidly drops,
the more urgent
the need
for a fresh start-
a new, different Life,
one devoid of The Commute’s
inherent strife.
it is only the second day of the new year,
and i wonder why am i here?
why didn’t i just disappear?
feel so ….
invisible and disposable,
useless and directionless.
alas, been in this place many times before,
so i know well the score:
and this, too, shall pass.
the question is
how long will it last?
burgeoninc 