Chronicles of the Mind

Do you take life as it's handed to you?

Does this question make you uncomfortable?

Do live in your own little bubble?

Does time tick away as you stare off in space?

Do you not know when, why, or what place?

There's no thought process--of course not. It's a "thanks, have a nice day" mentality, a "Hey, how are you?"

A rolling-off-the-tongue automatic question and answer, no ifs, ands, or buts.

Everything is memorized, it seems.

It's a muttering, sputtering, dazed cloud of really nothing and everything at all

It's the things you notice and the things you don't

The things you've long forgotten, and the things you know you won't,

The forgetting gets old, while the remembering gets painful

And the happiest moments are replayed in your mind

Like a movie reel, with your life as the main feature,

And you watch a caricature of yourself walking down the street

Doing nothing at all, but isn't it significant?

And you're laughing and crying and loving every second of living life

So full of life

An utterly lifeless life

But so full of good intention and looking forward to the future

Reminiscent of the past so that the present seems boring

But oh, those little moments!

When you're most unaware, they creep up on you and pull you out of despair

The despair of your arbitrary existence

As you wait for some excitement. You make your own, you see,

That's what you're for.

Oh, little one, stop and smell the flowers please

There is so much more out there if you take the time to see.

Don't just see it, really look.

Pause for a brief moment, and catch up with yourself.

Don't let life spin around you as you stand motionless.

You feel life in every fiber of your being, but--yet--you stand in an indifferent vacuum of time, motionless.

Here is your LIFE: look at it.

It exists all around you.

It's a face and a place and it's something you touch

It's the smell in the air, it's everything and nothing, it's much

Of the same thing over and over again until you're sick of it all

But you're a creature of consistency, you see?

So STOP.

Look around.

It's insistent, this hypnotic splendor.

It coaxes you into its trance as

The crooning lull of life sings your name;

And you can't help but wonder

As you keep on going under

If it is everything you thought it would be.

And you're drowning, you see, in life itself

An apocalyptic moment, paused, just for you.

You watch it go by

Childhood into adulthood

Memory by memory

Tied neatly in a bow, your own play by play.

Look--quick--before it changes.

Look--quick--and take it in.

Don't let it pass you by

You can learn how to fly

If you want to.

Seconds drag on into minutes, then hours

With each passing day

We speed through the weeks, the months, the years.

And when we get the chance to come up to bat

And make our name renowned

We feel horrifyingly alone in the bright, white lights.

And one solitary voice is heard above the endless chatter:

"Swing, batter, batter, batter"

before it's too late.

xoxo e