Throughout history, huge achievements have happened.
Shakespeare articulated emotion, tugging on the heartstrings of many.
Darwin developed the idea of adapting to outside stimuli.
The Wright Brothers taught us how to fly, Neil and Buzz walked on the moon.

We've seen people capable of
love,
evolving,
teaching others to fly,
technological advances.

Yet, not love for people who are different.
Yet, an inability to evolve to someone who isn't the same.
Yet, people are locking each other in cages, clipping their wings.
Yet, sociological advances grind to a screeching halt.

The human race is truly amazing, and has done some incredible things.
But let's not let past glory make us complacent and content with where we are.
We have a long way to go.

It's been five years.
****.

I could tell her faith was shaken.
I felt like I should do or say something...
anything.
but nothing came.
I was just as lost as she was..

Mathematically,
pi proves that sometimes being
irrational
is okay.
Even in such a cut-and-dry, structured science,
a little irrationality is accepted.
Sure, you cannot boil everything down to a
formula or math equation,
but that does not serve as a challenge for you to try.
Instead,
appreciate the spontaneity, randomness that comes
with these emotions,
just like your precious distribution of statistics.
Logic and reasoning may seem to take you far,
academically,
as will your critical mind,
but what success have you had outside of that vain?
Emotional healing?
None to speak of.
Mental growth?
Philosophically, no growth in a well being sense,
arguably a deterioration.
Social acceptance?
Only as close as your calculated eyes
allow people to get, before subconsciously
pushing them away,
a self-sabotage,
as to avoid any deeper connections
that could go wrong later
as so many have.
Instead of cynically
over analyzing everything
with your mind,
why not just open up your heart,
taking a blind leap of faith,
even if that is deemed,
"irrational"?
If you refuse to open up and be intimate with others,
why won't you at least trust me?

I'm getting tired of having these conversations
to a cold, unforgiving mirror.

"It was pride that made angels into devils.
Humility makes men into angels."
Well, then, Saint Augustine...
what happens when men are prideful?
For if this curse can transform
something as pure, genuine, serene even,
into evil incarnate,
what hope do mere mortals have?
How do we combat this inner demon,
whispering in our ear,
stroking our egos,
egging on vanities and successes,
when all we try to do is
belong.
To validate our existence.
To prove our worth.
To be able to point to something and say
"Hey, look what I can do,
all my hard work paid off."
While that's all well in good,
how can we safely toe the line
between having this pride and motivation,
without becoming consumed in the fire?

How come the only ones that seem to smile
are only doing so to hide the darkness they feel inside?
Preventing others from sharing their own pain,
completely bottling up,
grinning from ear to ear.
I guess I'm one to talk,
constantly flashing my dimples,
beaming a radiant aura of fake happiness.
But I smile on,
if only to help others lessen someone's pain,
even if I can't help my own.

In the midst of a hopeful new year,
stubborn ignorance longs for a refreshing beginning,
even if time is just a arbitrary social construct
devised to add order and pretended control to an essentially
chaotic reality, filled with otherwise random
summations of events that seem to only add
pain and misery to this exhausting existence.
Whether or not any of this is worth the effort
is another debate entirely,
as the "new year, new you" cliché
fails to grasp the inability some people have
to escape the darkness.
The past, entrenched in suffering, despair
growing in the shadows, eat away
at the edge's of one's psyche,
slowly,
continuously,
until the deterioration reaches the peak.
Inversely, sanity becoming nothing less
than a distant memory.
So distant, that its even a question if that
was a memory, or a diluted dream
born from a fantasy.
Ambition long gone as well,
fading things that used to be fun to the background,
like a picture without any saturation
dulling even what seemed to be the brightest flowers
to a completely boring gray.
After ambition and sanity,
I only fear what I'll lose next.