In eleven blocks
I still won't know if
I've moved or
I've died
and gone
eleven blocks away.
I wonder
am I really part of me,
or just a simple memory?
Child, you hold my life within
your tiny, little, fragile, new hands.
This is knowing ones true nature
and realizing
it is the most ridiculous thing of all.
It's like jumping off a bridge inside;
or not like that at all.
It's more or less exactly
like a dreamer
on a disc made of bullshit and magic,
with angry tomahawks
dancing through flaming hopes
and landing on the outer rim
of a second Milky Way,
exactly the same as ours;
except here you're a Platypus,
with a top hat and monocle,
and you only speak Mandarin and
jellyfish. Here Tuesdays are for
collecting your thoughts
because Wednesday to Sunday
is all about crashing through black holes
and emerging from the Sun
with a new sense of not knowing anything,
when it comes down to it,
and pretending to yourself
that you wouldn't ever be right here
looking back on the retina of your own
fully blown mind.

Child, Mondays are for praying
it's all over soon.

And it's my fault - this fatigue,
so I can't even stop dreaming.
If I blink it might fade.
If I breath I might stop breathing.
It's a drain, these conceptions of my conscience.
I'm completely uncertain of every fiber of my being,
because I can feel each and every one.
I know I might be real
and that's more real to me
than knowing God has a middle name,
and it doesn't rhyme with anything;
common and generic
like a billion dots in the sky and my thoughts.
And you, thinking you're a better friend, child.
Taking advantage of your self loathing
when you could be
loathing me instead.
A sip of the naked is nonsense to me child.
Since we parted,
you speed to stare when someone's coming.
Seeping stupid smiles.
Smiles like a child's;
and they scream because they're terrified.
Your lazy eye has that crazy look again.
You say it's me, but it's you
that fails to dance when the music stops.
I know it, we're both going crazy,
but maybe if we hold on to each other it'll all cancel out.
Still...
I can’t fly for you child,
nor land on the tip of the spear.
I’m not your puppet, child.
I’m not your musketeer.
Sure we think alike and look the same
and share the birth and given name,
but we are gravity and rocket ships;
constantly at odds but both determined
to overcome the other.
It is yet to be determined who is the moon
and who will strive for the stars,
but gravity is the common Universal,
determined to be without personality;
an everlasting vampire.
Rocket ships are short-lived disasters born to happen,
taking off from the gate like they can't wait
to get themselves killed,
all in the name of living.
Then again, maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe we're too much alike and
way too different to be the same.
Maybe you don't really love me.
You've never said it once, did you know?
We can't scratch each others backs
when we're always standing toe to toe.
These starry tentacles keep docking points
and at this rate I'll never get the high score,
but you're cheating,
coloring with crayons of made-up colors
like unpronounceable and peanut butter.
Am I scared of you? Sure I am.
Who wouldn't be? I know for sure that
I'm asking way too many questions
and that answering them
might be the first sign of insanity.
If I wasn't paying attention before;
but knowing that, I couldn't be?
Or could I be?
No, yes, that's no way to talk;
or should it be?
Perplexing as infinity; the two of us,
child.

01/29/2012

Author's Note: Re-edited. This is the final draft.

Posted on 01/29/2012
Copyright © 2024 Jody Pratt