I remember you asked me is this about you?

And my nerves twisted knots around walls I had made

As I watched my hands writing melodies stolen

from the hope I was hoping I’d feel for one day

I remember you told me there’s hope at the end

in the part I made up, reflections can’t be real

Where I let myself dream of life for a moment

Dream stars in the hands of the ocean my idol

Of freedom and peace and mysteries of power

In the strokes of each wave lacing words in the sand

pulling thoughts from my dreams of an ocean that lives

that loves and fights and breathes prayers without fears

I remember I wished with my heart on a star

that someday the lie could be a truth of its own

And I watched my hands forming words from the music

Oh the music I can finally write for you

If there is a line

Separating the good from bad,

I am pretty damn sure

It ain’t so straight.

#poetry

When your

soul is tired

no amount

of sleep

will relieve.

Don't close

your eyes

and sleep,

you need

to open

your eyes

and live.

It's bewildering and awe-inspiring how you have managed to unite communities who had never supported each other as strongly and concretely as this before. Congratulations on being a scientific phenomenon and surviving and making it this far. It's so cool how you haven't been assassinated yet.

Most of the time, I'm pretty chilled out and I'm never stressing out too hard. For the most part, I'm happy to be the therapist friend, and for my close friends I reach out at least once a week. It's typical for me to be really busy, but I do touch base with everyone in my circle enough to still be close. I'm firm in 'communication goes both ways' but I know good people can just be hesitant to make the move first. I know when I'm bothering someone, when they wanted the silence to last longer, and I know when people just really do forget.

It's work. Don't pretend like making that routine isn't work. Relationships take energy and effort, and most days I make a point to let the people I care know I care about them. Whether I have a lot to say or not, I do this because I care.

When I'm down in the dumps, I pull from those investments. Don't pretend like it's too expectant or too demanding. I now know how to recognize what I need and when I need for my mindfulness and well-being. And if my friends aren't willing to treat me the way I treat them, they are removed from my support system. I'm a good listener, but if that's all I am, that's the title. I don't look to my family because I know it doesn't help. And that's not a bad thing, it's just what it is. My friends are my chosen family for a reason, and I know who to go to for what I need.

Most of the time, I just need distraction. Sometimes, when I check in on someone, that's for me too. Everyone's guilty of solving other people's problems to distract from their own sometime in their life. Sometimes that's what it is, in disguise. Doesn't mean I'm using people, or that I'm not really valuing what they're saying to me. It means it matters to me too.

Other times, I need to be listened to. Talking is a way people organize what they think. And most of the time, when people rant or explain an issue they're solving, they already know what they want to and should do, but they need another opinion to deter them or encourage them. Sometimes just talking something through is what people need.

And when you need opinions and advice, don't take the internet seriously. It would take at least three credible friends to convince me to do anything or move forward with any plans that I didn't originally come up with. It's good to get ideas, but real friends over internet strangers any day.

When I'm not vibing and I'm not chillin, I reach out to the friends I know and love, and I let them know I'm cashing in a favor. This looks like a very cut-and-dry business model, but what's business without relationships? And it's not a business.

It's just going both ways.

I can't breathe,

You are kneeling to hard.

I understand you have to do a job.

I'm a victim instead of a criminal.

I'm sure for what I've done it's considered the minimal.

I'm screaming to you, so you might hear.

Your middle knee bone is on my neck near my ear.

Okay, quit, I give...I give.

I rather stop talking than to waste my chance to live.

C'mon man, I'm done, you can stand me up now.

I can't tell you any louder, because my breathing has gone down.

Listen to me..... get up, and read me my rights.

Don't take me from my family, children, and girlfriend tonite.

Sir, this is my last breath, I seriously can't breathe.

Tell my family and my girl, I love them and I didn't want to leave.

This is how I felt when I saw the cop with his knee on Mr. Floyd's neck. My prayers are

blessings go out to his family and girlfriend. Justice will take place.

one two three

one two three four five

one two three four five six seven

one two three four five six seven eight nine ten

the numbers are controlling my life

help me

i would turn this post in but it’s at 33 words and that’s not good

i don’t even like the sight of 33

thirty-three

better

but still 59 words

fifty-nine

even though thirty-three is two threes which are good

together is bad

and we can’t have that can we

i need to get to a good number

then i can sleep

but no number is a good number

and every number can always go further

and turn into a bad number

we’re at 114 which could be good if it was just 115

but it’s not

now 130 which would be good if i hadn’t added extra numbers

even though it has 13 in it

ten plus three

seems like it could be okay

but no

it’s terrible

ten and three are good apart

but together they’re terrible

and it’s 2:17 am which i hate

we need it on the hour

or 2:20

hell, even 2:22 would be better

and now we’re at 196 words

now 200

but i just can’t stop now

because 2 isn’t good enough

no

it’s too small and weak

like me

giving into the numbers that rule my life

starting on the right foot while walking

taking the right number of steps

saying the right words the right number of times

touching the wall in the right place

putting on my chapstick the right number of times

and if those thoughts come

god forbid those fucking thoughts

we can’t have those in this mind now can we

so to cleanse and tell ourself no

we have to touch the wood

and feel the dresser underneath our fingers

one two three four five times

with each hand in rapid succession

five times on each finger

like playing the piano

but as soon as i do that

the thoughts come back

and i have to do it again

that makes two

so i do it three more times

that makes five right

but it’s also 1 and then 4

neither of which are good

so we have to make it to ten

and the bad thoughts keep coming

and the tapping keeps going

and all i want to do is sleep

but when i close my eyes it happens

and 1 and 4 and 3 and 2 make ten

and ten is wonderful

but one? no

four? no

3? alright

two? no

and so we keep going

and i keep spiraling

farther and farther down into the abyss

it’s almost 2:22

which is the closest i’m going to get to a good time

and i have 460 words

i need five hundred

please

i can’t do this

i need to sleep

all i want to do is sleep

and my eyes are crying but i don’t feel a thing

fuck it’s 2:22

five hundred

There’s this streetlight off the corner of my house, and on my midnight beagle walk I noticed the light it threw onto our maple tree. Lots of rain today left droplets all over the leaves, tiny leaves, bunched in clusters just unfolding. They sparkled all over the tree. I stepped outside again just now to see them again before the sun evaporates their shine. Right now this maple that’s older than my deceased grandparents is dotted in green that’s more baby’s breath than leaf, but in a few weeks those leaves will dwarf my daughter’s hand, and the moment will have passed.

As far back as I can remember, I’ve been attuned to impermanence. It bestows value. I’d turn down the Tuck family water, I’ll pass on San Junipero, and more than the diet would dissuade me from vampirism. Of all the things I’ve watched and read, an A.E. Housman poem captures impermanence best. The last stanza is the motto I’m focused on here, but I figure if you’ve read this far, you’re probably down for skimming a twelve-line poem.

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough,

And stands about the woodland ride

Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,

Twenty will not come again,

And take from seventy springs a score,

It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom

Fifty springs are little room,

About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.

The speaker is twenty, the same age at which I first encountered this poem in Late Victorian Lit. There’s a passage in the Bible someplace (a person with better scriptural knowledge could tell you where) that offers seventy as mankind’s allotted lifespan. The speaker calculates that he will live through fifty more springs.

Housman’s perspective is so antithetical to how we reckon time. We’re always counting up and waiting to pass chronological milestones, starting when we’re kids and want to get our ears pierced or drive or buy beer. If we later dread birthday milestones, it’s because we don’t want to go bald or imagined a different career by now or don’t want to be alone at 35. We focus on how much sand has run through the hourglass. Barring a terminal diagnosis, we younger people never notice how much sand is left in the top. There’s always been sand there, un unknown quantity large enough to take for granted, so instead we look down to calculate what has drained.

Housman looks up, and he sees the cherry blossoms. His speaker is a young man but knows springs are not infinite. Not for him. Not for me.

Using the poem’s figures, I too had fifty more springs at first reading; now I have 33. If you’re of a more statistical bent, life expectancy in the U.S. suggests I’m likely to get 41. Either way, the magic number is shrinking.

So I made my dogs stand still, and then shortly after I returned to the empty sidewalk to see the maple revive in the raindrops. My daughter picked a dandelion yesterday, golden fuzz petals and milky stem. The previous homeowner’s irises are rising now; I’ll get to see them bloom for the twelfth time. A robin perched outside my window today and tried to shake its feathers dry.

I try to live these spring moments to witness them and their beauty, to remember what and where I am, and to feel a little of what Gerard Manley Hopkins called “the dearest freshness deep down things.” People have written worse descriptions of God, and we get so few glimpses.

When you are really curious how old the Prosers around you are, since you interact with many of them on a daily basis but still realize that anybody could be on the other side of the screen, and you want to find out but at the same time, knowing someone's age could completely destroy the person you were constructing in your imagination based on the posts you get to read.

That's me right now.

You peep out of your closet

Shivering as you hear the stairs creak

A renegade tear rolls down your cheek

You hug your knees to your chest

Close your eyes

Your life flashes by in your mind

How had you ended up like this

Alone?

Afraid?

Let me say

Your dad drank too much

Your mom walked out the door

Your siblings were taken away

You were left alone

Your heart beat races

Races like a horse

In the races

The door opens slowly

You want to scream

A foot enters into the space your in

Why is this the life you live?

Why is this the pain you have been put through

Why is this the way it is?

Why is this the life you live?

You see the tough leather

Wrapped around his hand

You see his face, disastrous and frightening

No one you know could understand

You don’t make a sound as he draws near

More crocodile tears fall from your eyes

He opens the closet door and takes you hand

And the belt comes down once again

The police come to your house

Distracting him long enough

You cry for help but it is weak

There isn’t enough blood 

Not enough to keep

Keep you going

Keep you safe

Keep you happy

Keep you normal

Keep you dreaming

Keep you loving

Keep you hating

The only emotion you feel right now

Is the pain for all that has been

You feel sorry

Sorry for him

Sorry for her

Sorry for the people he’s messed with

Because you know what it’s like

You close your eyes

Your breath shudders

You heart isn’t beating any longer

You know the medics try to help

But it happened too many times

For them to help

Why was that the life you lived?

Why was that the pain you were put through

Why was that the way it was?

Why was that the life you lived?