Sometimes I think that our bodies are like caves.

We're cold and rich with fungal mirth, swimming in the same mineral soup that stars were born of.

We spend our days working our marrow raw, breaking our joints to the beat of our daily commutes, and to what end?

For hope that the next ten-thousand generations will flourish, for the dream that they'll struggle less and have the chance to breathe—

We never did.

In all of our side-swept longings, we denied ourselves freedom of the ocean, the roads, the forest and nights spent in a lover's arms without setting our alarms.

Conformed to the grasp of routine we find small comforts in hot packed lunches and children's laughter heard from behind tinted windows as we drive past.

It hurts, and you don't know why, because they tell you that it shouldn't.

"You've got it all."

They say it with a smile that never meets the corners of their grey eyes.

"But it doesn't feel like it."

You want to scream back and let your lungs erupt into sun-gilt sky, your eyes scorched and searching for release.

You understand why Icarus licked his parched lips as he drowned into a welcoming sea:

You wonder how sweet it must have tasted.