"There's something about change that shakes me to my bones."

The frail woman shivers and tucks herself into her shawl. Her rocking chair slowly teeters; it could have been from last century or the one before. Like the lady in it, age is hard to determine, and the only certainty is everything in this house is old.

They sit together on the screened porch. Around them, white paint chips, flakes, and fades, but the haint blue ceiling is vibrant and fresh. Several two by four floorboards are yellow and unpainted, replaced recently by grandchildren or friendly neighbors.

Her chair has never known the business end of a paintbrush. It has a shine only decades of use can leave on the armrests; natural cedar color peeks around her housecoat and lap blanket.

"You've been her a long time, ma'am?" The man is an hourly temp employee from the Census Bureau. He is from the next county over, but he's never been to this little house along the marshes of Savannah.

"All my life, boy." She says this without the bite the words themselves imply. To her, every man is a boy; she remembers when radio was the entertainment for a household and Sears & Roebuck sold mail order homes.

"Does anyone live with you?"

She pauses her rocking and looks over at her guest. Her eyes are sharpened points in a nest of crow's feet, and she considers her words. "Live? No. Stay? Always."

"Come again?"

"Change ain't the only thing that scares me, boy. Staying the same, bein' still, goin' stagnant. Them that won't change; they scare me more."

"I don't understand, ma'am."

"One day I hope to move on. I've seen what happens to them that stay." She looks up at her blue ceiling and shivers in a way that has nothing to do with temperature.

"So I should mark you down as the only resident of this household?"

"You do your paperwork how you need to, son. I reckon it's true enough I'm the only one alive in the house."

The census man finishes his sweet tea, wishes the lady a good day, and pretends not to notice shadows dance across his path through live oaks back to his car.

there's something that needs changing alright

it's you not me

you with your screeching baggage grievances

my solitary soul blightly stagnant solidly set

it's you not me

forever fretting tumultuously discontent restless rue regret

mucking about disrupting my calm congealed convictions

it's you not me

that pressing whirlwind inside your flaming gut no heart

howling for things to be different than they certainly are

it's you not me

with your pathetic inability to manage make do carry on

simply setting your mind to the shiny chrome coping dial

instead of repeatedly frantically flipping the off/on switch

than begetting a bloody awful panic when you don't change

there's something that needs certain changing alright for sure

it's you not me

There's something about change

that leaves me terrified to make a move.

The fear of losing this,

for what feels like it'll be the last time,

is too great.

But the thought of change

also entices me.

It draws me in, then leaves me craving more.

Offers hope,

with no promise of following through.

The thing about change

is that it could go too many different ways.

It could be the best thing that ever happens to me,

or it could devastate me,

tear me apart in the blink of an eye.

The big thing though,

about change,

is that it can also happen slowly.

You could pull away,

we could fade, become lost.

And that type of change

is what keeps me coming back for more,

I get this false hope that you're not leaving.

I put my livelihood on the line

for someone who has no intention of staying.

Change can be positive,

but it's mostly only noticed

when it hurts.

When it tears apart

the one thing you have to live for.

There’s something about change

you should know.

It has no free will;

it’s true; I tell you so.

Greed drives change

for better and worse:

better for driver,

worse for driven.

It happens unexpectedly,

or it may seem so,

but never without motive,

means or opportunity.

Change is a game

you should know,

for those with motive

means and opportunity.

It’s called changing the rules.

When you learn to play the game,

someone changes the rules.

There's something about change that makes me want to scream. Why can't things go back to the way they were before? I was happy, I was young, I had no worries. Life happened, change happened and now I'm like this. The world can be cold and dark and lonely and all it takes is one mistake for everything to crumble.

I'm trapped in the past.

Hoping each day won't be my last.

Who I was before,

I am not anymore.

The darkness creeps in,

I learned and sinned.

I thought I knew,

But now I don't know who.

Who am I?

Years ago I would cry,

If I just knew what life would be like now I would have chosen to die.

There's something about change. It turned out the Earth really was flat. That was a real change.

All of his data, which he knew to trust unconditionally and whose accuracy was beyond reproach, was tweaked. After all, he had artificial intelligence on his side. He had corrected for a decimal place here, a pixel there--Voila! We were so wrong all these years, he huffed to himself. About so many things. There was a new wind a'blowin'.

Perhaps this new flat Earth's exploration needed a new manifest destiny. To the edge!

He thought about those conquerors who had gotten too close. Where were they now? Had their expansionist ambitions pushed them over?

He invoked Revelation 7:1,

“I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back its four winds.”

He invoked geometry:

Three points make a plane; four corners make Earth flat!

Gabriel, Michael, Raphael, and Uriel were our protection from the four winds--Boreas from the North; Zephyrus, the West; Notus, the South; and Eurus, the East.

He knew that winds, however favorable, abruptly turn. Fair winds can foul as capriciously as ill winds can lose their stench. Things can change. So could people.

He invoked Dylan:

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the winds blow."

He worshipped his world of breaking news and saw winds of change. From Monarchy to Democracy, to Aristocracy, to Autocracy, to Theocracy, to Divine Right Authority and the Idiocracy who prayed at its altar.

He invoked his erstwhile philosopher, Sumus Cocoonus:

"Sometimes a democracy just gets what it duly deserves."

Is it really about truth and justice and the American way? he wondered. Really, Superman? What would Nietzsche say? Was his Übermensch born under a red sun, too?

He considered the kings who had risen and fallen. Societies that had experimented wildly. The good-idea revolutions. And the many suffering persecution for justice's sake. Did any get their kingdom of Heaven?

He knew his history.

Some made it in 1776. All in one day. Others abroad took what they had and let their systems either mellow or sour, via revolt or complacency. Some change and get along; some don't. Many can never.

But then, he realized, a democracy just gets what it wants before it gets what it deserves. We can shove anyone who disagrees off to the side until they teeter on the edge. Live square or die!

"Such righteousness, on our good, flat Earth," he shouted triumphantly, "is in the Bible! It's Divine Right! How could we lose?"

There's something about change

The unruly knight of time

Laughing in the face of fortune

Clashing with the known

There's something about change

Jesting at predictability

Severing bonds of promise

Spinning webs of progress

To dance in the streets of madness

And relish petty ire

There's something about change

Keening for lost desire

Hardened by blood and coin

Corrupted by lust of men

Cosmic fingers clench tighter

Steady lies the master

Kings enslaved and helots crowned

There's something about change

A cosmic confluence

Entwining time with fate