i've begun to notice
the end of love is a bit like cancer

in the beginning stages,
you may not even notice
anything is wrong.
once in awhile,
something out of the ordinary occurs
and you convince yourself
you have control

then, you're in denial of the disease.

don't be ridiculous,
i'm fine.
we're fine.

exponentially it gets worse
out of your control

until one morning you wake up
to clumps of hair on your pillow from
the attempts to stop the
disease
and you're left embarrassed
vulnerable
stripped of your will and
energy

until finally,
you give in.
you're defeated.
you're both defeated.
all you can do is wait
for it to conquer you

and even if you heal
you know you'll never be the same
you'll always be scarred

i guess you could say i'm successful
i guess you could say i have potential
i guess you could say i have a bright future
but at what cost?

if your life is
pouring over endless pages and
vocabulary words
saturday classes and
the endless typing of monotonous papers
are you really living?

i want to be like the girls
who wear tight dresses
and drink too much on friday night

i want to point to a place on my map
pack up my things
and make new adventures

i want to feel the exhilaration
of falling through life
with no idea where i'm going to end up

i'm so tired of being
sensible
i want to be alive

Then a lawyer said, "But what of our Laws, master?"
And he answered:

You delight in laying down laws,
Yet you delight more in breaking them.
Like children playing by the ocean who build sand-towers with
  constancy and then destroy them with laughter.
But while you build your sand-towers the ocean brings more sand to the shore,
And when you destroy them, the ocean laughs with you.
Verily the ocean laughs always with the innocent.

But what of those to whom life is not an ocean, and man-made laws are
  not sand-towers,
But to whom life is a rock, and the law a chisel with which they
  would carve it in their own likeness?
What of the ******* who hates dancers?
What of the ox who loves his yoke and deems the elk and deer of the
  forest stray and vagrant things?
What of the old serpent who cannot shed his skin, and calls all
  others naked and shameless?
And of him who comes early to the wedding-feast, and when over-fed
  and tired goes his way saying that all feasts are violation and all
  feasters law-breakers?

What shall I say of these save that they too stand in the sunlight,
  but with their backs to the sun?
They see only their shadows, and their shadows are their laws.
And what is the sun to them but a caster of shadows?
And what is it to acknowledge the laws but to stoop down and trace
  their shadows upon the earth?

But you who walk facing the sun, what images drawn on the earth can hold you?
You who travel with the wind, what weathervane shall direct your course?
What man's law shall bind you if you break your yoke but upon no
  man's prison door?
What laws shall you fear if you dance but stumble against no man's
  iron chains?
And who is he that shall bring you to judgment if you tear off your
  garment yet leave it in no man's path?
People of Orphalese, you can muffle the drum, and you can loosen the
  strings of the lyre, but who shall command the skylark not to sing?

Said the little boy, "Sometimes I drop my spoon."
Said the old man, "I do that too."
The little boy whispered, "I wet my pants."
"I do that too," laughed the little old man.
Said the little boy, "I often cry."
The old man nodded, "So do I."
"But worst of all," said the boy, "it seems
Grown-ups don't pay attention to me."
And he felt the warmth of a wrinkled old hand.
"I know what you mean," said the little old man.