There is a future
Where it might have worked
A future where you did end up falling for me
As I did for you
Would it still have lasted
What would it have become I wonder?
Asking that is fruitless
It didn't
Not in this universe
I'll go to sleep tonight wondering anyways
And wondering how and where you are
In this area of this universe

I hope you're well.

Goodnight.

There are two little fires sitting next to me
They radiate a fierce warmth meant only for themselves
The light and heat of their dance Illuminate the dim bar with a loving And jealous radience
If I sit too close
Or look directly
I will burn myself
Their fire is for themselves
But it's warm nonetheless
And I don't mind
I hope their fires burn for a long time to come

It started in a coffee shop
Where you worked
Four days a week
And I knew the hours
I knew it with a deep visceral longing
With a terror and a joy
A forbidden pleasure that sickens me
And I tried very hard to let you be
But you took the town over
With the musk of a presence that I longed for with the whole of my being
All the while, the quiet and logical part of my disrupted mind reminded me that being near you was not appropriate
How I loathed that Vulcan presence
But I heeded it more or less.
And as you became attached to all the little places
In this quiet little town
I knew I had to leave
in order to let my violent need die
And now having lived in a far off state I sit at the SeaTac gates
And the old familiar clutch of deaths bony palm on my soft intestines squeezes, and a small anxious voice whispers
What if she gets out at this gate?
Do you now own the whole of Alaska?
If I find you move to Chicago
Will I quail at O'Haire
With the small chance that you're there?

I  walk cautiously into the future
Through the dark fog
Of what could be, but isn't
There is a veil to pierce
And there are many ways to advance the story
Sometimes I hesitate
Wondering why I can't pause for a moment to enjoy what I have earned
But even if I wait or stall
The world moves regardless of me
And everything keeps changing
So that I need to catch up if I wait too long
Sometimes I feel like it speeds up and
I need to run faster, more efficiently
To keep pace with an idea of where I should be relative to the rest of it.
And sometimes I feel like a planetary body
Caught in the gravity of what is happening around me
And I will go where the forces pull me. And that my own will is so integrated into greater things that it just seems negligeable in comparison
But for brief moments,
Like a diver coming up for air,
Or a mountain climber with a good ledge
I can pause, and catch my breath,
And for a brief and fleeting moment
I can see the world around me,
Where I am in it,
And what lies ahead
And with those few seconds
Maybe I can alter my trajectory.

Zen monks talk of detachment
Of emptiness, for will or want
Towards the clearing of all desire
And in the great translucent sea
Of their complete freedom
They speak of the perfect simplicity
Of their mountain abode
And mundane chores for the maintenance of earthly vessels
Mentioning, only in passing,
How serene the world is in their high cold house
And how nice the whole world looks
Framed in their peasant doorway

I envy the envyless
Nowadays who can afford a whole  mountain to themselves.

My mind feels empty, empty of purpose, meaning,
Empty of the will to act on the world,
What is the world,
A stage of actors that moves timewise towards oblivion
A sphere of energy or motion,
Moving where?
And where am I moving in it
Where do I need to be
Do I need to be anywhere
Is there a meaningful difference between here
Or there, or there,
Between being at a friends house,
Or in jail,
Between being in Colorado or Kazahkstan
I mean it sort of matters,
Like how an ant prefers to be in the anthill
Instead of the ocean
But then is it just preference,
Or is purpose, and place, merely a function of existence
Is it necessary that I be a human, and act like a human
Because I'm a human?
Is my destiny tied to that?
So is my destiny just to be me, because I'm me,
and then someone else will be themselves, and that's just it
Society is just a bunch of selves, attempting to be themselves
and creating a standard of self, based on themselves,
Perpetuating a form of being that seems convenient,
And also somewhat meaningless
So if being me, is only important for maintaining the illusion
Of the meaningfulness of me.
Then is there meaning in being someone else,
Or in being something else?
Or being somewhere else?
Or is that just a shade of the same thing
Is there even meaning to the word meaning in the personal sense
Or is meaning so tied to essential function,
That to be meaningful, or live meaningfully
Is just to be as you as you can be?
And that's enough?
Or is it to become yourself, and then to choose what means you?
To decide what you mean, as a function, as a person
To yourself
To others?
I don't know,
I'm just asking for a friend.

I didn't have the guts to be a rebel
All the counterculture called at me
Asking me to join
In living rooms with Goodwill couches
Owned by a friend of a friend of a friend
They reached out to me
Hands and hearts so open that they couldn't stop bleeding
Asking me to join them
To make what I felt
To do what I wanted
Regardless of whatever the rules said.
They asked me,

Passing the tokens of a shared insobriety
That sought out the essential truth beneath
A thousand and one layers of culture and biology and social pressure
That only ever manages to turn diamonds into coal

I don't have the testicular fortitude to forsake the gifts of my birthright
My middle-class hope
Of a sliver of land beholden to an HOA
Of a wife who loves me kind of and children that will hold me to an anachronistic social standard that will leave me wanting
But it could be mine
It could be a world of my own making
With love and joy and plenty
And the mediocrity and turmoil
That is essential to life whether it is good or bad
It could be mine

The true face of the world is violent
And life struggles unconditionally to enact it's will on a world
That has extinguished more species than are alive

We are mayflies in the cosmos waxing and waning
And no one cares
And no one guarantees that I will eat tomorrow
Let alone find love
Or persist in the presence of my ancestors.

I don't have the ***** to wager my little bits of happiness
Even if there is a slim chance to change a million minds or more
Call me a coward
Call me a pragmatist
In a century call me dead
Right now you can call me mostly happy
And I don't know if there is anything better