Flashes
Strobe light photos of pasts that never passed
(Crawling has never happened so fast)
Learning to run before I could walk
Falling and tumbling
Learning but stumbling
Fumbling for words or an image to grasp
And nothing has changed.

Fragments without structure, deranged
And nothing has changed
Clouded, determining what color is the sky,
Something tells me that the basics
Are a lie.

An ax to defend is nothing
When joints are rusted
(oil, oil)
Every hanging picture needs adjusted,
Repainted, or torn down to start again.
Even destroyed, it still looks uneven.

Rattle off directions when I don’t have a compass,
As cliché as it can be, I’m lost more or less,
Looking for more and more to confess,
But circling around myself,
A vulture in search of one last meal,
Dead flesh just to feed and taste and feel,
Even if it comes back up again
To serve as ink for my mind’s pen.

Each solution raises the same questions,
Why bother when i can’t look past my own confessions?
When every idea leads in circular directions,
Like a computer telling you there’s a god,
“Based on statistics”

The shallow parts are too cold to step foot in,
But I’ve been in that lake before,
I coughed up the water once I reached the shore,
I’d never return again, I swore.
The skies are neon
But the water is black,
And even
If I wanted to,
There’s no going back.

Strange how my failures share a common theme,
Like a nightmare world
Recurring dream.
I let my memories wash away,
Only to wonder what I’ve forgotten.
(does it matter, when every emotion is rotten?)
Just when I feel my mind’s been infested…
“None of your business.  Not interested.”

I’ll look the other way as if I had a direction,
As if I knew the difference from insight and reflection.
Waiting as if there’s a way to find,
Or a purpose conveniently underlined.
I’ll bide my time.