To the Ocean
When it ends, what will I have left unaccomplished? Worse yet, what could I never accomplish, even in a thousand lifetimes? I do what I can, with what I have, and it will never be enough. I could never be enough, not for her. But I’ll be what I can, for as long as I can, and as long as she’ll have me.
On my back again, lying in the dark, of my room and of my heart. Lying to myself. In the ebon silence, thoughts race, plans form, are discarded, and reform. I love. I am loved. I care, and therefore I must. How do I save them? What can I do to ease their agony, to bring happiness to my loves, and to my luv?
It’s late. The last of the drunks are starting to roll in. I can hear their raucous laughter in the hall, cutting through the thin dorm door, biting my ears.
Frail white walls are so much thinner than my own. Loneliness spawns violent anger, hungry to tear down both. One so transparent it may as well not exist. The other so cold, so heavy, slowly suffocating my soul.
I would be safer if I were cold inside as well, if I didn’t let myself care so much. I could turn it off, tune it out, and stop feeling their pain. Then I would stop needing to help them, to hold them. But it’s not what I want. I am passion. I am intensity. I don’t want to stop caring, stop feeling. It wouldn’t be me. The end would have come, and it already approaches too fast.
The guy next door is making some girl moan. He doesn’t know she’s faking, but I do. It’s all in the tone, the tone of the moan, lacking a certain sincerity. I’ve heard it before, the falsity, just before I let myself go, drawing out the uncontrollable utterances of real ecstasy, tearing them from the hundred throats I’ve kissed. They sound almost surprised the first time, not having suspected the fervor behind the façade. But its there just the same, and they come back for it, no matter whose name I murmur, or scream.
Many faces mark my fantasies. Many names roll off my tongue, and seldom the same twice. So few souls leave a mark upon mine, so pitifully few. I have always walked alone, yet never been solitary. Is it my arrogance that holds me apart? Perhaps, though the view has merit. Not all are worth my time, so limited, so precious, so quickly and inevitably slipping away. Seconds falling away like sands through an hourglass. The common metaphor is too optimistic, too slow, and too quaint for my tastes. Reality is more harsh, and less real.
I am a drop of water, running down the rapids to the sea, my home. So many faces line the banks, so many cold hearts and tattered souls. I try to reach out, while I can, picking and choosing, warming and mending, screaming inside whenever my feeble grasp misses one.
I am a drop of water, trying to be a rock, knowing it’s impossible. I let them lean, and I stand, and eventually I will crumble. I pray I last a little longer, but each moment the current is stronger, sweeping me away.
I am not as great as I think I am. I cannot make it go away. I cannot heal your hurts. I cannot help them all, and it slaughters me. I will die a thousand times before I reach the ocean.
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