drowning

We are never fully prepared for the ferocity of a new love. We can't be. Love doesn't arrive within a gentle tap on the shoulder or a gentle nibble on the ear. It is the original sucker punch. An unannounced closed fist delivered at the speed of light into the heart, which is often followed by the sudden expulsion of air from the lungs. We've all been there and some of us never get that air back. But as you get older you learn to take the punches. The heart becomes tougher and we learn to read the terrain as we approach love. We see the exit ramps and the side roads. We realise the giddiness in our thoughts is due entirely to the slow draining of blood from our brains. The mild obsession and fascinations we realise, are no more than the encircling fins heralding our end.

But love is cruellest when it arrives too late and when a misspent life littered with mistakes tells you that you are not worthy of this love. That is a moment that I fear the most. When love is dangled before me. When happiness is within my grasp. They say a drowning man will always takes someone with him; if given the opportunity.

I however find the weight of my sins is enough to convince me that I must drown alone.

grating expectations

I like her
she makes me smile
I feel an attraction
but all I could paint
was a collage of light bondage
and chickens on crack

truly

a tastier dish
I have never seen
than lean pork sausages
and granola

still bleeding

I was chatting to someone through "WhatsApp" recently about my life. So, basically I was reducing years of pain into brief castrated sentences sprinkled with emojis. After we had finished I felt depressed. My wounds had reopened. I was bleeding again. It still gets to me sometimes. My Wife's adultery as my Father slowly died of Cancer. The 7 years alone with my children. The decision to let someone go, who I had loved and needed. But I had always put my children first and that is something I will never regret. Then when they both turned 14, they left me to live with their Mum. My daughter dropped my surname for her Mother's maiden name. She then posted pictures of her Mum's partner calling him the "Best Dad in the World." Twist a knife between my ribs and it would have hurt less.

My ex is a bitter woman. Twisted by revenge. Obsessed with money and clinging to her youth like someone clinging to a ledge. She will fall one day and she will fall hard. But that's her journey, not mine. In truth I must confess that I don't know how I manage to get up in the morning or how I even find the energy to care for others. As some days the pain is unbearable. But I don't yield to this pain. I never yield. I just keep moving forward. Life also holds not even the slightest mystery for me now, yet pleasure is found in the simplest of things. A sunrise. A smile. A child's laughter. Helping others. But I no longer suffer fools or people who take me for granted. If someone doesn't appreciate or value me then I step away without any hesitation. If someone asks me to dilute myself or take back a kindness then I return to their shadows.

For who I am now, is no longer negotiable..... and for the first time, in what fells like a lifetime, I like me.

carpe noctem

Let me put forward a memory: I am in bed with a woman. I am reading a book and then I start to feel a fingernail engrave a lascivious suggestion down the middle of my back. I don't react as I am in the middle of a paragraph, although a part of my body was already receiving and translating the message. The anatomical part to which I refer is an involuntary organ which is detached but still capable of overwriting common sense and ruining my life. The scratching continues. The paragraph is nearly spent and my mind is now split between unbridled ravaging and the journey of the protagonist in my novel. But as the last word is devoured I hear a sigh followed by a loud thump as she turns away.

"There was a time you couldn't keep your hands off me."
"I'm sorry, I was just finishing the chapter."
In that last word I felt the weight of her final judgement before it was even delivered.
"So, the book is better than me."
I was reading Milan Kundera and for a nanosecond my brain regained control and held back my "of course not" reply.
"I was just trapped in the flow of the page. I'm sorry."
"Do you still love me?"
At this point I realise that I am playing a tiresome game that only the inexperienced and emotionally insecure love to play. No matter what happens now the sex will be boiled down to an empty involuntary reaction. It will lack spontaneity and it will lack love.

I loved her. In fact I adored her. But a few months later the rot had started and within a year we had finished sleeping together. To this day I can still look at the cover of the "Unbearable Lightness of Being" and vividly recall the moment. There were obviously other reasons why we parted. The most amusing one that I surmised a week after we parted was that she was a Scorpio, a water sign, and I was a Virgo, an earth sign. Basically, we were mud.

However, my point is this. I loved her but my brain was engaged in a book. I was wrestling with Parmenides and Nietzsche. I was very willing and equally able to wrestle with her beneath the duvet but my mind needed to separate itself from sixties Czechoslovakia first. Maybe, I was guilty of lust in the beginning and maybe it had died off a little. However, to find doubt in a man's love because he didn't throw down a novel as you ploughed his back is nonsensical and slightly ludicrous.

I am now in my early fifties. Divorced. Single. Borderline bitter. I still read in bed. But my back is free of scratch marks and my libido a little dustier. So would I close a book quicker if I had company tonight? Would I risk losing carnal pleasures again? Well, with age comes wisdom and a richer love. I like to think that today I would be reading to her and that the punctuation would dictate the best time to scratch.

malcolm

He was cremated at 9am this morning. That's the slot in the crematorium that nobody wants. So, he had no mourners to recount tall stories and no high praise for his charitable acts or simple acts of kindness to strangers. But in truth there couldn't be any stories or praise as he was a self-absorbed recluse. A man who lived apart. A man who was and will be easily forgotten. In his past, he had loved and she had tragically died. They said he never recovered. He then blamed his parents for imagined sins and found solace in alcohol. He lost years of his life to this self-abuse and finally ended up in a flat in Brixton. Alone and surrounded by music that he never listened to and books that he never read.

This morning they slid him into the cremation chamber, locked the door and at the flick of a switch, incinerated his flesh to ash. He is no more. His evil, for there was some, lives on. His good is lost and unrecorded. But he was no Caesar. He was just a man. Troubled by a life that never caught a dream or found a love. Yet he was a story that is often told and a life that is duplicated by millions. I didn't know him and I never met him. I can only wade through the detritus of his life and bear witness to the squalor in the rooms he inhabited. I can only formulate a theory as to how he lived and know with absolute certainty that he died alone in a park.

But he was an artist. He had an eye for capturing the essence of a skyline or the gentle curve of a woman's lower back. And he was also a writer haunted by deep black depressive thoughts which were wrapped within a desperately lost soul. Yet he was still someone's son and he was loved by a woman he called, Mum. So, in my heart I put aside the sins and the crimes he visited upon others and instead imagine a newly born child in his mother's arms. Then in that one perfect moment I whisper a silent prayer for them both.



(For Sue and Malcolm)

the things we don't eat for love

Throughout my life I have been influenced by the women that I have mercilessly adored. It is my "Achilles Heel" or more accurately a rare strain of emotional oscillation, which ironically almost always ends up as emotional isolation. At its extreme this weakness in the "presence of femininity" has seen me converting to Catholicism and at its mildest saw me agreeing with the importance of "New Romanticism" in 80s culture. Needless to say, I am now a militant Atheist and if someone foolishly plays Spandau Ballet at a party I feel a strong urge to kill the Kemp brothers.

This urge to mimic a passion or religious zeal in my dates is clearly based upon a wonderful weakness within my personality. I freely admit this as when it comes to love I tend to test the depth of a puddle from a springboard. That is where I actually find some solace in this incurable condition. For I am the eternal optimist, who believes that the puddle is not only deep but warm. I also firmly believe, like the proverbial bullet, that there is undoubtedly someone out there for me. So even though I approach love with the same trepidation as most. Once I get a bounce from my board I am airborne and performing triple somersaults with half twists. As I hurtle like a rocket towards my very shallow icy puddle.

Anyway, back to my latest decision and its physical and mental ramifications. I recently became a Vegetarian and to the outside world that monumental gesture is currently being miss sold as a health choice and a one man effort to combat global warming. But, I am far more fickle than that. I changed my diet because of a woman. I am now in fact more soya than man. I also know what Tofu is and how best to cook with it. Two years ago that would have been like admitting that I have watched an episode of "Keeping Up With Kardashians". I would like to make it clear at this point that I have never watched an episode of this nonsense and if pressed I could not tell you which one of the women was formally a man with a very large arse.

But unlike my decision to seek enlightenment from an omniscient entity who has numerous outlets worldwide and my short and painful dalliance with Kajagoogoo. I do at least feel that this woman has given me something of value. I am losing weight and my concertina chin has been replaced by a face I remember from my past. I am sleeping better and I feel healthier and stronger. Yet even though I know it will only ultimately lead to nothing more than acute "vegetarian warming"; the glacial retreat of visceral fat from my abs. The fact that I am beginning to look more like me and less like Jabba the Hutt is emotionally gratifying.

There is no grace in my failings or crust of wisdom to, break, bless and share. I am a man who aspires to repeat his best mistakes. I do this without any hesitation and whilst being fully aware that the odds are and never will be in my favour. I am becoming the physical personification of the "final futile gesture" and I truly expect to be listed in the Oxford Dictionary as a sub entry under "Hopeless" in 2018. Be that as it may, I am and always will be the hopeless romantic and the most loyal friend. Searching for love in places that people have long since abandoned or marked as radioactive. Befriending and defending the hopeless and vulnerable.

One day I will undoubtedly die and I will drop kick that tin bucket knowing that there is no God. But I will also know that "Enjoy the Silence" by Depeche Mode, is sublimely ironic "wake music". As for whether I will still be a sad, single vegetarian; well that remains to be steamed from what remains of my new and healthier life.

a Dublin dream

I watched the sun rise across a Dublin sky

and from my bed I heard her voice

asking if I wanted tea, coffee or something softer

so much to take in

so many senses unnumbed

so I peel back the sheets

and walk into her arms

sleepy and warm

surrounded by the smell of fresh coffee

and a voice that pulls me apart

piece by piece by piece

through the window I see the river

through the window I see her walk away

she turns

she smiles

and as I finish my coffee

I long for her "something softer"

laughing through my days

occasionally
but not often enough
I feel my life lurch forward
within a laugh
and sometimes
but not nearly enough
I laugh with someone else
and we lurch forward together

the perfect gin

somewhere over Germany

an easy smile with a gentle voice

asks "would you like a drink sir?"

I suddenly realise the benefits of middle age

and greying hair

a little respect at last

albeit compulsory

"I would" I reply

but I leave her waiting for my choice

"a gin and tonic please, heavy on gin and light on tonic."

she serves it within a fragile plastic cup

which she rocks with ice

then within my pressurised world

within my little life

that hurtles towards Berlin

my perfect gin

lubricates a weary mind

and makes a hard landing

very smooth indeed

an empty hand

he held my hand

as a child

he gave me gentle hugs

and gentler smiles

he listened

to my first words

and in my youth
he gave me his wisdom

to use

to discard

to mock
he cared for me in ways
I never understood

until parenthood was mine

but as an adult
I ignored the greying hair
and his fragile ways

for to me he was immortal
a man who would never leave

and then one morning

I looked upon a giant
whittled down to a fragile man
asleep
never to awake again

and in that moment of loss
I felt the fullness of his heart
and the emptiness in my hand

(For my Dad)

light bulb fruit

walking between tools and nails
that I didn't need

I turn a corner

and fall into a corridor of blinding light

hundreds of lights
burning fiercely

in the middle was a woman

reaching up

reaching up

reaching high

reaching into the light

picking bright light bulb fruit

so bright

so unbelievably bright
so painfully bright

she turned
she looked at me

with eyes filled with mercury
and a pure white smile

my buddhist buddy

I met
a buddhist teacher
he was old and grey
but his wisdom
was fresh and minty
he spoke of fearlessness
and compassion
I listened for a while
but there was no truth
in his words for me
so as the others chanted
I turned to the sky
and as the afternoon
drifted into the night
I found myself
beneath a bowl of stars
and a single shinning truth
the days are often warm
and the nights are often cold
we are born
we eventually die
but inbetween
there's fun to be had

just say goodbye

just say goodbye
and move on
turn the page
close the book
burn it
or add it to the others
we never read
just say goodbye
and let everything go
watch it fall
or don't
it doesn't matter
because the wrong things
aren't meant to last
hold the bitter
I'll take the sweet
forget everything
I will not respond
I will not engage
I will not write a solitary word
for I can feel goodbye
in your words
and this silence
move on
keep walking
and put distance and time
between us

a question asked

I defend myself with words
punctuated with borrowed wisdom
from minds with original thoughts
my beliefs are composed
of actions and inactions
but enlightenment eludes me
I fumble and claw at ideologies
that have wrestled kings to their graves
who am I to fight this noble battle?
I care not for odds
or for the soldiers who fight beside me
I care not for honour
or the greater good
for I know I stand alone
an outsider
who was born to not belong
so ask your questions
decipher my answers
then unravel my life
but I can not be known
for the key to my mystery
is missing
and locked within
my sardonic smile

tabula rasa

I yearn for the ignorance of my youth
for there is too much weight in my thoughts
my soul has absorbed the suffering
of a thousand lies
and my eyes have seen more
than my heart can hold
where has my naivety gone?
where is the easy trust
and the blind obedience to the state?
now I lay beneath the sword
living in the moments and echoes
and savouring the sunrise
then smiling as I hear the thread break

the soul

a soul is silent

it is the flesh that is loud

a soul is bright

it is the world that is dark

what lies ahead

if I could map my heart
I would navigate around the pain
that you have yet to give me
I would plot a course between your first smile
and your final goodbye
I would raise sail and blind my eyes
from the man who replaces me
and I would steer towards
the darkest storm
and the sharpest rocks
oblivious
of what awaits

in dublin

if I had not returned
not remembered a promise
not walked back
not turned right

not turned left

if I waited one moment less
or one moment more

I would not have seen

your smile
I would have not heard
your voice
I would not have learnt
your name

and my life would have been
colder for it

how to forget

delete every text
delete every email
tear up your poems
erase the unfinished letters
save nothing
pour water on your heart
steady the pulse
dream her out of your nights
remove her name from your lips
cover her face with darkness
drown her voice with silence

and then forget how to smile

the valentine

unrequited love
returned
unwrapped
but the rose is still sent
and the words still written
brave
futile
gestures
have always been my thing
and I like to think
they always will

room 487

there's a knack to the key cards
green and I am in
red and I'm just an idiot
in a hallway
it's a different hotel
but the room is the same
I unpack nothing
I switch on the TV
but I don't listen
it's just background noise
for the emptiness
through the glass
I see another city
and as darkness falls
the same noisy lights rise
nothing is new
nothing surprises me
I smile at my reflection
caught between
a room and a skyline
stay there I tell myself
for neither side
has anything to offer you

mornings should be

to awake

within a woman's arms

to breath and inhale

her fragrance

her sex

to turn and by a single touch

arouse the longing

that has so long been mine

to taste

to consume

and be consumed

then to lay spent in each other's arms

content within the symmetry of love

the lost valentine

falling in love with the promise
of someone like you
my Dulcinea
but I am no knight
I have no quest
maybe a little "nut loose"
but I see wind turbines
not monsters
now I realise that life
occasionally keeps her promises
but age is like bars of steel
tempered with irony
and the cruellest jailors of our hearts
are the broken hopes we cling to
so maybe just maybe
life is teaching me
that the best loves are the ones we carry
secretly
tucked and folded in our hearts
for none to see
for more often than not
they last a lifetime
so never search for me
for the man who writes these words
just know that there is someone
who from time to time
holds up your heart to the light
and sees no flaws





(Some of these words were for an unsent Valentine. But it was not fear that held me back but a truth. The measure of any heart is found when we examine the inventory and see what is missing and what was let go. I chose to let go.)

waiting to board

silent lovers holding hands
and exchanging knowing smiles
university students cutting the air
with coarse laughter about sex
and binge drinking
the businessman adjust his posture
to hear more detail
or less
I don't know
the brunette in the beanie is reading Kafka
he's not my favourite
an old couple fumble with passports
and euros
he smiles at her
and she kisses his forehead
years of love compressed
into one simple act
I sink back and think about today
about tomorrow
I think about my place in this world
and my purpose
I look at everyone around me
as if they were alternate lives
in alternate worlds
I marvel at the diversity
of this human condition
and for the first time in my life
I realise that we are all passengers
heading to different destinations

painting his endings

another ending has begun
but still he pledges allegiance
to his favourite lie
and as he holds Occam's razor
against his wrist
refusing to take the simplest explanation
unwilling in even the dying seconds
to untangle his heart
with the hands that refuse
to let go of her name
choosing instead
to open a fresher wound
for this is now his passion
his art
he'll take the blows
and he'll bleed out a little more
for this is his ink
and he still believes
that within it
she still breathes

his final masterpiece

dangerous curves

happiness can be
found by avoiding
candlelight
and florists
sunsets
and warm empty beaches
autumn forests cut by sunlight
and red wine devoured
on shrinking sofas
poorly written poetry
and cotton dresses
held up by a simple bow
restaurants on valentine's night
and blind dates arranged
by careless friends
soft voices in moonlight
and goodnight kisses
on slender necks
but lastly
and most importantly
you must avoid
her curves
her dangerous curves

desperately seeking me

I have seen war

but only the wounds of others
have left their scars
and I have seen sacrifice
and an unwillingness to yield
to love
to death
and to a thousand vices
I have bled love
and lost a lover’s heart
I have hated and spoken
falsehoods of others
I have told the truth
and damned my soul for it
I have created life
and in that birth found my father's heart
I have laughed with friends
so hard I cried
I have seen friends die
and watched many just fade away

I have been called husband
dad
lover
friend
brother
son
uncle
enemy
bastard
and sir
I have caused pain to others
yet gave everything
when I had nothing left to give
I have made bad decisions
and good ones that could
have been better
I have misjudged others
and given many too much trust
I have refused to listen
yet screamed and kicked
when I could not be heard

I have betrayed love with my heart
but never my body
I have defended the weak more times
than I have walked away
I have given the illusion of defeat
but known none in my heart
and yet still I would go into battle
knowing that I could never win
I have stood within the hatred of others
and stained my pride for life
and in my ignorance
I have mocked race and religion
yet I would defend anyone
from bigotry
injustice
or harm

I have moved through life
with the momentum
from fear
anger
love
pain
joy
and disbelief
I have cried in the rain
and screamed in a storm
I have faced death
and felt both fear and relief
in its shadow
I have lived alone
and with a lover
I have seen a sunset
that burnt the heavens
and a night that felt
like the end of the world
I have witnessed so many
moments
yet so many more are
forgotten
relegated
lost
discarded
or burnt to ash

I have learnt
that love is intermittent
and that we are not faultless
but amazingly flawed
I have been my own contradiction
and a paradox of virtue to others
I have been the hypocrite
and the fool
I have been the romantic
and still the fool
I have fallen from the grace
of too many gods
and studied the wisdom
of those who tried to make sense
of this chaos
and in doing so
found only that all that I know
is that I know nothing

like Dorian's picture
I rot with age
yet still I feel the echo of my youth
I have danced in the rain
like a madman
to the music of Jagger and Richards
I have drunk with beery strangers
and savoured a fine wine alone
I have smoked cannabis
and laughed as I choked
I have prayed for things
no god would grant
and been given things
that I did not want
and some I never realised
I needed

I have closets filled with bones
and moments
that I wish I could rewrite
or erase
I have been haunted by unrequited love
and inspired by new
I have let go and lost
I have held on and lost
I have been asked to change
to lie
to steal
to break hearts
and immobilise souls
yet still I held true
to a creed
built on the ruins of my sins
that we are indeed in the end
the sum of the good we create
and the kindness we gift

(a work and life in progress...)

the hogan

white paper

pinned at an uneasy pace

with unworkable words

the strokes form nonsense

and line after line
dissolve before me

dropping the haste

of my running thoughts

like litter on bitterly cold streets

for no word or words

can capture

the warmth that fills

my heart

when I merely think

of your name

(sometimes you can not write what needs to be said.... )

I love you

I love you
a sentence
just a simple sentence

some whisper it into sleepy ears
some casually throw it to appease
some drop it thoughtlessly
some fumble with its volatility
some blow their hearts to bits
some practice it in front of mirrors
some deliver it with a Shakespearean air
some deliver it through drunk and uncooperative lips
some say it through a mask of tears
some capsize it
some harbour it safely
some tame it
some bend it
some break it
some respect its mouthwatering richness
some deny it and thirst
some release it too soon
some release it too late
some make is seamless
some make it sharp

I love you
a sentence
just a simple sentence

katie

walking into

a solitary moment

with thoughts

I can only dream

of catching

that is how

I will remember you

arthur

he glances up
from life stained eyes

as he swallows his pint
and surveys the room

his mortally wounded flesh

which decays as we watch him

will only be mourned

by the dented barrels

in the damp cellars

he always pays with change

careful to discard

the silver fives that

he hates so much

he lays them in beery puddles
to annoy the tepid barman

then shuffles back to his corner seat

unhurried
uncaring

and surrounded by a generation

that will never remember him

he quietly sips to their youth
with frothy bleached lips
and open flies

for he is Old Arthur

a man whose court opens

at midday and shuts at eleven

a king whose Avalon awaits

within a pint a rough cider

(he was an old man who had worked the docks in Bristol.. he sat in the same spot in the pub for over 40 years.. we talked often and played cribbage.. and I was one of four at his funeral)

the little bang theory

"We're in this for infinity and then some." said God to his sub contractors.

"There will be problems." he added
"And my design will continually evolve!"
"So, do you still want the job?" he asked
The contractors nodded and shouted, "Yes!"
But secretly they mulled over his plans and looked at areas where corners could be cut.
"Let's make it round instead of square." said one and when God wasn't looking they all nodded.

what if

exhausted and godless

pulled from my roots

I lay at your side

admiring the gentle curves

that defend your heart

this game

your rules

so relaxed

so bold

so irreverent to love

tears me apart

every time you say

"what if?"

upon reflection

he stands near

the edge of the pool

placing negatives over the winter

it was spring then

she walked towards him

half lost in a morning mist

a man

this man

stands where he stood then

waiting for the years

to recede

to forgive

to heal

and then return him

to that morning

to that love

the days between now and then

have rolled seamlessly into one

it is only the man who changes

he waits for a while

as if he expects her to return

but in the end

he walks away alone

the image stolen

tinted

altered

and put in his pocket

for in his mind

he stands with her still

(I suppose this is love from the perspective of youth. I still savour the moment and the woman but I have to put it into the context of who we were then. Some loves are still timeless but all are worth remembering. For in the end, that we loved and were loved in return, is all that surely matters.)

the problem with porridge

one was too far
one was too married
one was too near
one was too young
one was too afraid
but all were just right
and that's the problem with love
it can be eaten hot or cold

not whole

she tells me about her hair
her legs
and her looks
she tells me that a little affair
would be healthy for me
she tells me that she thinks in pictures
but that she worries
that I will see through her
but I do not tell her of my fear
that my heart would crack
if I sowed myself into her words
and as I walk away
I realise that although not broken
I am still not whole


28th March 2014

love

love I often think
is an acronym for

losers

often

vanish

entirely

I would
because I usually do

enough now

there is a place

that exists

between

our fingertips

where "what ifs" burst
and happy endings burn

my song is ending
for my time was yesterday
and tomorrow is all yours
my days are sepia
and yours are still crisp
and dripping with technicolour

still unwritten
still young
I will not burden you
for I love this love too much

but a part of me
the unbroken part
that resonates in your voice
and dies repeatedly in your eyes
will keep this love
like a secret
like a unspoken wish
until my song is sung

joy in misread adverts

Just misread a dating advert in FaceBook.. thought it said "Find Logical Women"... for a moment I was really interested...

the poet

he will cut open his feelings

and bleed them across

fields of paper

he will drag them
claw at them

erase them

and then bind them

around his empty heart

a heart that waits for a spark

and then the words

will write his love

upon another's heart

I will forgive me

so we are here
it is time to end
this is our final moment
all your sins and smiles
miscounted or not
don't matter anymore
you still judge yourself
you still hold too many regrets
let go
it never mattered to me

your mind holds the echo
of our youth
and though our mind holds on
our flesh has already let it go
our heart is tired now
it has raced us across fields
through love
through laughter
and pain
now it says enough
rest easy
stop running
look up and see the sun

I do not hold your crimes
above your name
I just hold the hand of a man who lived
and loved
and tried to find a peace
that was never his to find
so rest easy now

your legacy may be lost
but none are kept true
your words will be forgotten
but will be repeated unknowingly
by others who follow us
for this experience
is not unique
it is shared by all mankind

we have lived my friend
and in some days we soared
so let us rest easy now
let us close our eyes
savour that last breath
and smile together
as one
for now it ends for us both





(I once wondered what I would say to myself if I could be there when I was dying.)

the irish uppercut

she jabbed me with a smile
it glanced off my jaw
but then came her laugh
square on my chin
two quick jabs with her eyes
sent a sucker punch to my heart
I was down
all was black and stars
and all I could hear was the count
higher the numbers rose
my corner screamed
two
three
four
get up
five
fight back you fool
six
but I had no strength
seven
I had no fight left in me
eight
for in truth
nine
I was happy to finally lose
ten

you're out



Written on the 4th March 2016
Inspired on the 3rd March 2016

(For SBMH)

you I asleep

curled
snug
close
within
tucked
hungry
devoured
one

driving

Hours ahead of me. Hours behind me. I grip the wheel tightly as if it was the only thing pulling me forward. I think about letting go and letting my car pull away. But there is nothing metaphysical in the steel and glass that wraps me within. If I let go I will just kill myself. The miles count down in decimals on a device that tracks my exact position in this world. Ironically even though I know where I am, I don't know where I am. Roads narrow and widen. Traffic roars into emptiness and then I am stillness. I am within a journey. My track may be linear but the pace is governed by a dice roll, weather and idiots with poor spatial awareness. My day ends long after the sun sets and my day often begins before the sun rises. I am momentum. I am a point between the distance between two points. I am nowhere. I am somewhere.