Lost in the Illusion

 It's like floating...
Like falling backwards...
Like that moment
Right before you go to sleep
Where you feel your body
Drop...
Right down through the mattress
As if it were suddenly,
For an instant,
Gone into some other dimension...
And you startle yourself
Awake...
Imagine that,
But slower,
And more constant...
A pervading and persistent feeling of falling...
Very slow motion...
It feels like fading away...
Dispersing in the wind...
Dissolving into the Universe...
Just one
Infinitesimal part
Of this impossible thing...
This is all a dream...
Once upon a time,
The nothingness 
Became self aware...
If the true concept of nothing,
Void, the Absolute, exists,
Then not even the rules of 
Time, space, and physics
Exist...
So,
Upon self examination,
By becoming aware
Of its lack of being,
It suddenly
Became something...
No rules...
And this really blew its mind...
Why do I exist?
How do I exist?
What am I?
Not asked in words,
But in emotions
Churning through 
This new mind...
*
The nothing become something
Likely freaked out...
Shattered like glass
Into an infinitude of pieces
Exploding out
Into a new concept 
Called "space/time"...
The Big Bang...
*
And here we are,
13 or so 
Billion years later,
Apes who can build things...
Apes who can fly...
Apes who drive cars...
Apes who suffer
From all manner of psychological
Angst, anxiety, and depression, 
Asking,
"Why do I exist?
How do I exist?
What am I?"

It's Not About Multidimensional Entities Manifesting as Clowns

 

I have unintentionally hurt people.
Some people have unintentionally hurt me.
I have intentionally hurt people.
Some have intentionally hurt me.
I'm sure all parties involved
Labeled it as
"Self defense."
Emotional hurt.
We do what we feel
We have to
To survive.
We distance ourselves
From potential
Sources of pain.
Some, like myself,
Isolate ourselves,
Since human entanglements 
Often lead to 
Pain.
I'm not good at
Keeping up with friends
Or family...
Scar tissue
Has made it hard
To motivate
To reach out.
There are some people,
However, 
That I have intentionally
Cut off...
Gray rock, block, delete,...
I get anxious 
Around other people's emotions,
Because I get anxious
Around my own...
I get anxious
About other people's problems
Because I feel sometimes
Overwhelmed by my own...
I know about projection,
And I try not to do it,
But it's not always easy...
I'm often suspicious,
And sometimes fearful.
Depression and anxiety
Can be
Cement around your feet
With a constant feeling
That the water is too deep,
Rising too quickly,
And full of hungry, toothy fishes...
Beasts with lights in the dark
Designed to draw you close
For ease of consumption...
Lights in the darkness,
They can't be trusted...
Don't follow the light,
As the original Poltergeist movie advised...
Lights in the dark
Can be predatory...
Lights in the dark
Are not always what they seem...
I have been
That light in the dark,
So I know this to be true...
I have been bruised and wounded
By those
Lights in the dark,
And I have bruised others.
We all float down here.
You'll float, too.

Disengaged

 

Most people
Never fail to live up
To my lowered expectations
Of humanity...
Don't worry,
I include myself in
"Humanity"...
I'm not being an elitist...
Being human
Is messy work...
Dealing with other humans
Is messy work...
Dealing with the "other"
In yourself,
Even more messy...
True altruism, 
I don't think
I believe in it...
Everything we do
Is a balm or a salve
To soothe some
Irritation,
Or fulfill some
Personal need...
Every god we worship,
Every idea we entertain,
Every moment of everyday
That we actively 
Think...
Not that many of us
Do much
Active thinking,
But, still...
* * *
I can hear the rain
Pouring down outside
These walls...
Chatter
Echoing in the halls...
Occasional wails and moans
In this house of pain...
This isn't a metaphor...
I'm actually sitting for someone
In a rehab facility...
This is what I hear...
* * *
Every person here
Is human,
Although
It sometimes
Feels and sounds
(And smells)
Like a kennel...
* * *
The birdhouse at the zoo
With
Colorful screaming parrots
Who have learned
To mimic
Human profanities...
And here I am
Making light
Of human suffering...
* * *
Sometimes
I'm a horrible person...
Sometimes
I seem almost angelic,
But what are demons
Other than angels
Who discovered free will
That was separate
From God's will?
* * *
We are all one...
We are all the same being,
The same universal mind...
Not knowing that,
Not being certain of that,
Is a part
Of where our troubles begin...
* * *
This, too, shall pass...
x

A Mess of Self-Pity

 

Since the last divorce,
Two years gone by now,
And I have forgotten
How to be social...
Forgotten how to connect
With new people...
Smiling faces sometimes...
I have little to no trust left...
I don't remember how to do small talk...
I've forgotten how to be 
Acceptably fake 
In the typical social sense...
I don't know how to feel comfortable
Around people anymore...
I used to have no problem being myself,
But now I fear that
Being myself
Wouldn't be desirable...
I have gotten to know myself better,
With age,
And I've always been "weird"
In an endearing way...
Awkward charm...
My opinion of myself
No longer identifies with the endearing
Part of that sentiment...
I don't trust
What they might want from me...
I don't trust that they won't use me...
I don't trust
That they will accept me as I am...
I've got things about myself
That I do love,
But they seem to me
To be superficial things...
In other ways,
I actually sometimes feel like a
Genuinely horrible person...
The first tears in a while
Are starting to trickle out
As I write this...
I'm being honest with myself...
About what I'm feeling...
And it is terribly uncomfortable...
I feel alone...
My closest and oldest friends
Live hundreds of miles away...
And, for those who are geologically closer,
I have trouble motivating 
To drive just 60 miles if it's not for work...
I can't get a hug from them 
At a moments notice...
Some, not at all...
Same with my family...
I have somehow taken myself
To some foreign land
And gotten stuck in amber...
Maybe more like a tar pit...
It's hard to breathe 
When you're starving for touch...
At this current moment in time
I am sitting in a chair next to what could very well be me
At 75 years old...
Morbidly depressed...
Unable to motivate
To even want to get out of bed...
He can, he simply doesn't...
He has friends and family who care,
But who don't know what to do,
And their efforts and care
Are visibly exhausting them...
And I don't want to be that man...
I don't want to turn into that man
Lying in that bed
Trapped inside his own mind...
He's my Ghost of Christmas Future...
I don't want to give up on life,
But I can see the temptation 
To do so...
He's not suicidal,
But he's giving up...
And the worst part
For me
Is that I totally understand
What he's feeling...
How he's feeling it...
I've actually almost been there,
A time or two...
I don't want to go back to those places
So full of desolation
And solitude...
I don't want to be that man
Wasting away
In his bed
Some twenty odd years from now...
But I fear it.