Brainsprain.net

In a disused field
at the end of an untraveled road
sits an abandoned warehouse
a forgotten boy
gives an unseen performance
he has practiced for weeks
charted the progress of the sun
across the gritty floor
so the light would be perfect
he plays all the parts
he is riveting
and captivating
and his audience
which is also him
gives him a standing ovation
and when he bows in gratitude
a single teardrop
hits the floor
and mixes with the grit there
and dries
and is also quickly forgot
and the flowers outside
which are not beautiful
because, he was told once
by someone who knows
are merely weeds
nod their indifference
to the dry unfeeling breeze
are his harshest
and only
critics

I saw him again today, way off in the distance

Under his rainbow, his lawnmower pushing him higher

Does he know how it makes me feel to see him

Way up in the sky, doing donuts around zephyrs?

Like singing in joy at his freedom from the ground

His distance from it measured not in humdrum x

Or boring y… But in the unexplored dimension of z

And cursing his name for reminding me that my feet

Are ungratefully stuck to the nurturing ground

As I trudge from my car to my door

My load at once lightened by his joy

And immediately weighted down by my own lack of flight

So he has no net effect on me

And I don’t write this

And I don’t yearn to fly

What if everything I know is illusion?

Nothing more substantive than images on a television screen?

The things I worry about are empty nothings?

The things I hold dear are hollow promises?

What if the illusion is me?

Then so is my worry and so are my loves.

And the empty hollow nothing is

unworthy of self indulgent

air quotes

poetry

I wake up lost
But a small voice says I’m here
I wake up thinking no one needs me
But a small voice says they do
I wake up feeling insignificant
But a small voice says I’m not
I wake up aching with lonliness
But that voice says I’m not alone
I wake up empty
But I know I am full

I want to believe that voice
But I wake up thinking it’s lying

I spend my day letting it convince me
I to go bed found, needed, important, befriended, fulfilled

But I wake up lost
I wake up craving validation
Hungry for attention
starving for that small voice
which some days
is too small
and too weak