Sucks to be us, or what I'll remember some day a long time ago.
Moments deep in the night, just before I’m left to sleep, I dream of things past and their coming days, an impossible proposition. I dwell on tasks I’ve yet to take on, I fret over perils of a distant past still full in view, and through this all courses the vitality of my being and thoughts of one I love. What of dreams can be trusted? They lie ever in wait, the word in that sense reveals both edges of a sword such as this; insomuch that they are merely a lie, yet strong enough in their conviction that they have nothing to do but wait, as we succumb one and all to the need for sleep, returning to these unsolicited musings. These thoughts, the visions of an empty world, they shape the time we keep under lock and key, under spell of dream we are not alone, our greatest fears enrage us, our darkest fantasies enliven us, even as we set our best attempts and intentions against the outside world (keeping it outside our door) we cannot avoid who we are, even if we are unfamiliar with that person.
We are not disturbed by words, nor visitor, but rather by the demise of a fully functioning human experience, as the day is done, as the night grows and goes dark and silent, we succumb to the succor of slumber, as babies do, as kings do; the un-avoidable entities of the nether-depths of our psyche play out, waiting no longer to cast into view the thoughts of ourselves about ourselves we never knew.
Beholden to none, these thoughts of subversive places confront us, some hued an amber of the past, others glimpses of abstract futures; and no moderation, no pretenses, no civility can check them. It is the ultimate injustice, the great irony of sleep: For all the closed eyes of the world not a single one can look away.
The old man, having long ago been broken by the world he once knew realizes the scope of his existence while awake; his finality, and even in sleeping he goes before his thoughts. And there is another man, seemingly a world away, oblivious to dreams, mindful of nothing that is not present and heretofore shaping the world as he spies it in an instant. He counts himself by the twinkle of his eye and the spring in his step, days spent reveling in youth, ignorant of limits. But for this indiscretion one cannot find malice enough to fault him, happiness is found not in the number of days alive but in the quality had within that span. And still against these mistakes he holds his youth, someday still to realize the lessons he must learn are before him yet. And like every youth, one and all, he continues on in such a fashion, the world about him is broad, and the day is light, and the road is never dark, at least not for long when you are young. And of course there is nothing like that great teacher inexperience; who knows the hardest lessons learned are always the ones about things of which we are so certain, that is, just before we are made painfully aware of that very thing being violently opposed to our previous position. And just as this all comes to bear, we find we are no longer quite so young, or quite so smart.
That young man wakes up, and no longer is he either, it was not the world separating him from being the former or the latter, rather it was time, and again he is gray. Lost or squandered long ago lie the remnants of his opportunity, and in turn the greater part of him that was vitality. But he has forgotten neither, and one may speculate if it would be better had he done otherwise; accordingly man remembers, and as such he speculates, both of which serve to haunt him when the ability to do either betrays him.
This laughter; these memories of youth, our joy, is quantifiable, for all of both we are quick to forget, as our friends once served to define us, very quickly in the past they are behind us. Left alone now but for idle tears we go on. The things we remember most ardently, become like so much bars of gold to a swimmer in the ocean: you can struggle for the wealth of your memories, or you can let go and float on, alive, albeit in a world much more tawdry and barren than before for the loss of things we hold most dear to us.
In this fashion we become quite heavy, saturated at this point wholly by tears, torn by the compromises we have made between loving and living, those empty hours spent following the loss of a life, and the miracle in the same which keeps us living past that point. We carry our burdens like a cross, cherishing the tears of remembrance even as they leave scars upon the heart. Life’s like this: as we are survivors we learn guilt, as we are lovers we learn hate, and as we are human we come to know pain. It is the people and places somewhere within us we must never forget, lest we can never be forgiven. And by these choices, through these concessions we know loss, giving away our friends, depleting youth, distancing ourselves in paces and memories from the world we once knew. And finally, it all gets to be so desperate that we long only for days long since passed; we want only our yesterdays, dreading so much the tomorrows to come which will be barren of things we’ve lost that we are incapable of living in the present, we make the future our history, it’s just that this is impossible. And that is why they say we passed on; our futures spent forever fast asleep, hopelessly lost in dreams of the past
We are not disturbed by words, nor visitor, but rather by the demise of a fully functioning human experience, as the day is done, as the night grows and goes dark and silent, we succumb to the succor of slumber, as babies do, as kings do; the un-avoidable entities of the nether-depths of our psyche play out, waiting no longer to cast into view the thoughts of ourselves about ourselves we never knew.
Beholden to none, these thoughts of subversive places confront us, some hued an amber of the past, others glimpses of abstract futures; and no moderation, no pretenses, no civility can check them. It is the ultimate injustice, the great irony of sleep: For all the closed eyes of the world not a single one can look away.
The old man, having long ago been broken by the world he once knew realizes the scope of his existence while awake; his finality, and even in sleeping he goes before his thoughts. And there is another man, seemingly a world away, oblivious to dreams, mindful of nothing that is not present and heretofore shaping the world as he spies it in an instant. He counts himself by the twinkle of his eye and the spring in his step, days spent reveling in youth, ignorant of limits. But for this indiscretion one cannot find malice enough to fault him, happiness is found not in the number of days alive but in the quality had within that span. And still against these mistakes he holds his youth, someday still to realize the lessons he must learn are before him yet. And like every youth, one and all, he continues on in such a fashion, the world about him is broad, and the day is light, and the road is never dark, at least not for long when you are young. And of course there is nothing like that great teacher inexperience; who knows the hardest lessons learned are always the ones about things of which we are so certain, that is, just before we are made painfully aware of that very thing being violently opposed to our previous position. And just as this all comes to bear, we find we are no longer quite so young, or quite so smart.
That young man wakes up, and no longer is he either, it was not the world separating him from being the former or the latter, rather it was time, and again he is gray. Lost or squandered long ago lie the remnants of his opportunity, and in turn the greater part of him that was vitality. But he has forgotten neither, and one may speculate if it would be better had he done otherwise; accordingly man remembers, and as such he speculates, both of which serve to haunt him when the ability to do either betrays him.
This laughter; these memories of youth, our joy, is quantifiable, for all of both we are quick to forget, as our friends once served to define us, very quickly in the past they are behind us. Left alone now but for idle tears we go on. The things we remember most ardently, become like so much bars of gold to a swimmer in the ocean: you can struggle for the wealth of your memories, or you can let go and float on, alive, albeit in a world much more tawdry and barren than before for the loss of things we hold most dear to us.
In this fashion we become quite heavy, saturated at this point wholly by tears, torn by the compromises we have made between loving and living, those empty hours spent following the loss of a life, and the miracle in the same which keeps us living past that point. We carry our burdens like a cross, cherishing the tears of remembrance even as they leave scars upon the heart. Life’s like this: as we are survivors we learn guilt, as we are lovers we learn hate, and as we are human we come to know pain. It is the people and places somewhere within us we must never forget, lest we can never be forgiven. And by these choices, through these concessions we know loss, giving away our friends, depleting youth, distancing ourselves in paces and memories from the world we once knew. And finally, it all gets to be so desperate that we long only for days long since passed; we want only our yesterdays, dreading so much the tomorrows to come which will be barren of things we’ve lost that we are incapable of living in the present, we make the future our history, it’s just that this is impossible. And that is why they say we passed on; our futures spent forever fast asleep, hopelessly lost in dreams of the past
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