An old poem.
I wrote this nearly 4 years ago, and dug it up recently after perusing what used to be my (old) personal blog. Re-reading it felt like I was being catapulted through time, to a life both simpler yet just as complex as the life I live now. Strangely enough I still relate to the me back then, even though our lives have since diverged in curious, painful ways.
A poem about high school, by an emotional 18 year old. By emotional, I do not mean weepy, tearful, or weak. I mean full of emotion. Living, breathing, feeling. This is what it means to be human. To feel like a human.
It hurts, sometimes.
circles
routine; mundane.
soothing.
safe.
mindless rings around a dimly lit parking lot
a certain comfort within the centripetal force
that binds you to this turf, like pages in a book
except the other pages have since long gone
and you are all that remains in this ghostly monument
a lifeless husk
lifting the burden of this forgotten story on your single, frayed page
you struggle and flail, for a minute
then float,
reminisce.
shadows race the sun to the edge of the earth
but you remain unhurried.
cool and collected, always.
you sit in your old high school parking lot
wondering? remembering? wishing you could just move on already.
but something ties you to the ground
the asphalt you once claimed as yours.
you and your small grey Toyota sit in silence,
wordlessly soaking in the remnants
of a once familiar life
gazing at a land once conquered
toying with the thought
that you might still be who you were a year ago,
jumping into lakes with friends at midnight
tossing ping pong balls into cups for some reason
smoking weed around a bonfire
chasing each other in the dark
heart rushing louder than life
head spinning
free, like a bird.
a distant police siren awakens you from your reverie.
and you think, who am I now?
bound by responsibility and
caged in stuffy gray boxes
suffocated by your own weighty expectations,
the American Dream no longer a dream
but a burgeoning reality
or a nightmare, it’s hard to tell
promising success and prosperity, it handcuffs you
drags you to work every day
during the summer! how unthinkable
no respite
no face paced breaths,
no heart stopping laughs.
you wonder if you are becoming machinery.
is this what dreams are made of?
