Are we not but sinking ships?
Slowly but surely,
Fathom by fathom,
Taking on caustic water yearly,
Our cerebral captains have run a loose ship,
Mutiny is the standard,
The posts aren’t manned,
And the hull is leaking,
The navigator is mollified at the helm,
Drunk on a rum of broken aspirations,
And there’s always a storm in the distance,
We drift past similar vessels,
Kindred spirits,
Unable to salvage one another,
And is that not what we are,
Just shipwrecks in the end.
I’ve been stuck on this vacation,
With no booked flight away,
Years in this spherical stockade,
Built on predation and blood money,
I don’t savour this holiday,
The brochure never mentioned this,
I think I need a new guidebook,
These pages tell me nothing,
Where are the merits to this long weekend?
I’ve yet to see the point,
The beaches and bays of life,
The stunning sights and marvels,
The sunbathing and horse-riding of existence,
Where are they on this map?
The guidebook lied,
It gives me no answers,
I call this a vacation,
But it’s more of a purgatory.
Under motionless skies,
I stand here,
More perplexed than usual,
I’ve lost my sense of direction,
Or perhaps purpose,
Surrounded by dirt roads,
In all conceivable directions
Twisting about each other like vipers,
Some lined with hellfire and caltrops,
Others with pine trees and skinwalkers,
No path onward is safe I fear,
Even those coated in glitter and sun,
Is this what being lost is?
No signposts to offer clarity,
So what do I do?
Take a step?
A city is not its landmarks,
They are merely brick and mortar mascara,
Traps for tourists,
A city is its soul,
The veins of the urban centres,
The cobblestone lifeblood of a city,
The alleyways and sights less seen,
The sights and spices and blood,
The sweat and tears and backstreets,
In these asphalt warrens,
You’ll see the real life of the city,
The real people,
The blood cells through these capillaries.
Ahh yes,
That dank motel has many stories,
Each room a storybook of flesh,
A rogues gallery of sorts,
In a cloak of cigarette smoke,
This room here,
Contains a beggarly prodigy of paint,
A Picasso in poverty,
That room there,
It contains a young couple in love,
Fleeing a pair of oppressive households,
That room at the end,
The lady there killed her decorated husband,
For striking her one too many times,
The road has all kinds of refuse,
Much finds its way here,
Travellers and outcasts of all shades,
Drawn like moths to its neon sign,
A haven on these backroads,
A den to sleep in,
A hole to fade in.
I keep walking,
Day by year by century,
Battered and bloodied,
Like a dreadnought shelled from shore,
Calloused toes escaping my socks,
Torn and slate-hued as they are,
My feet only shielded by cotton remnants,
My shoes wore away eons ago,
Burned away upon the Earths face,
As I keep walking,
Now the elements chew at my soles,
Bitten by pebbles and life both,
Pools of acid and discarded razors,
Ore fashioned of every cruel word,
Ripping my socks further,
This has been going on for so long,
I know I could get new socks,
Temporarily soothing the hurts,
It’s a novel concept,
Alas I must keep walking.
Life is rife with peril,
It’s a journey across lands unknown,
A yellow brick road,
Laden with trash and pennies,
No matter how far you walk,
There’ll always come a bridge,
Built upon miracles and curses,
Under which all manner of troll could hide,
It’s perilous yet unavoidable,
A turning point in some eyes,
You must cross the bridge,
Life demands it,
So keep living and walking,
Follow the road,
And cross another bridge,
And another.
You must be a cartographer in this life,
Despite what some say,
You have to find your own way,
The years offer no signposts,
Nor safe havens to rest,
You’ll concoct your own journey through decades,
The good and bad,
Plot a course to avoid the Bermuda triangles,
Those treacherous reefs of liars and hurt,
Serpentine sharks and heckling jackals,
The need for navigation never ceases,
The years want you to be adrift,
Will you be lost like Leichhardt?
Or will you be Amelia Earhart?
A failure or a legend?
I feel as if I have split from the convoy,
That expedition towards consequence,
And found myself in a desert,
Adrift and inconsequent,
Wandering dunes in delirium,
Desiccating further with each step,
Day and night,
I scan the horizon for the path ahead,
Tracing mirages with my shaking hand,
The heat painting illusions on to my eyes,
Distant skylines and Everests,
Tornadoes and tsunamis,
My throat blisters from the aridity,
I need to sate my thirst,
To be worth something,
If aqua is life,
And life is valuable,
Then I must drink,
But scarcity is the name of the game,
The mirages keep me irrelevant,
To sway me from a drop of value,
There could even be an oasis here,
But I remain lost and wanting,
Worthless amid the barrens.
We glide through heaven daily,
Battered like a hot air balloon,
Swirled through lifes winds,
Thrown to and fro,
As the worlds zephyrs are thrown against us,
Heartbreaks and triumphs evolutions,
Air pressure in all directions agitated,
The beat of life is an ebb and flow,
No clear route is existent,
An ascent after a swoop,
And back again,
There’ll always be another climb,
So keep flying.
WorldofHarley 