Longing not to Belong

another semi-lyrical meandering where I pretend to be profound

Photo by Noah Silliman, on Unsplash

Everything has its place, a keepsake, a date, admitting mistakes. I talk of tomorrow too often because prudence mocks my relationship with today and exacerbates yesterday’s headache. But it hurts in a different way, one in which I can’t place my body in the right place. Between locations and limbs, my wish for comfort fights erratic nerves, my chin heavy with whims so inactive they’re dying. Writhing in awkward positions, I wonder whether I’m looking at it all wrong, a misguided notion that I must Belong, a perception conceived in darkness, nurtured, then thrust unreadily into obscure lighting, alive but fractured. The shade is lighter yet more devious: colder. 

Perhaps forty-three is too late to thwart cynicism and search for nothing from here to nowhere and repair my distorted vision. The damage is done, some say, irreversible. Wear jaded on your sleeve and adopt the fuck-its. Move on. Get over or under it, distract your senses. Repulse yourself with indulgence. But what about alterations? 

I have cheese caked onto my shirt.

Moving on is an illusion no more sensible than relocating, breaking away to change states all to escape what you won’t learn until it’s too late. Fighting wind would be easier than exploring your exterior for comfort. Think. We run from change while advocating for it, towing protest signs like just-married cans, with various regrets written on each. Who will you blame? Empty bags get heavier the farther you travel. Imagine your shoulders, already so bent and sagging. How far will you make it before you see the mess of decades you wasted thinking you knew more than everybody else yet didn’t know that to belong meant acceptance? Breathe and be. You are here. Forget the map. Don’t look over there. Mirrors aren’t necessary to recognize the dust on your self-perception. Your ideals alter the senses and obstruct your touch. But if you must look, vanity of vanities and all that, appreciate the changes and know the older you get—no matter how much you smile—you can’t hide the sadness. Inescapable fear dilates the pupils. The skin feels like brimstone, looks like rust. You creak as a weather-beaten deck would, untreated, splintered, redolent of stale tears from so many seasons of weeping inwardly.

Pain and belonging cuddle one another, sing the same song, slightly out of tune, and slay brain waves while you move automatically and work steadily toward a holiday. Same allegory, different narrative. Justifications are premature remorse. Metamorphosis is inevitable. Where—is unimportant, merely coordinates. Regardless, it’s hard to see. The lighting sucks. Everything is disordered, an effervescent miasma of putrid smoke. A hall of jokes. 

This is all Heidegger's fault. 

My neurotransmitters are wandering again, collecting doubt and echoing a din as piercing as a dog whistle. 

Hence, the meandering. 

I must go.

Nope, I’m already there.