crisis

I spy with my little eye,

Something beginning with... me.

The kettle boils and I stare at beige panelled tiles,

beige as my life,

beige as the shade of grey covering my face when I say I’m okay

so… this is it,

this is future me,

this is the me seventeen-year-old me never envisaged,

this is the me still tussling with, perfectionism, faith and sin

still in the boxing ring,

still guarded and alert on edge,

eyes darting right to left,

this is the me fourteen-year-old me never saw coming,

often lonely, trying to figure out who’s phony

through smoke screens of so-called family and so-called friendships,

I try to play the game of patience,

and wise my way through the vices of people I love,

but this is me, coming to the edge

having drunk to the dregs my compassion for liars.

this is me, at my limit,

with the only comfort to my hands a cup of coffee.

the irony...

have I been sleeping this whole time?

did I miss the aroma of reality?

snuggled up next to childish fantasies of being independent,

of being an adult?

this is the me ten-year-old me never envisaged,

unpicking much of what I have thought to be true,

zooming in,

tweezering out ingrown hairs on skin I swore was smooth

the thought this morning is so unsettling,

I allow myself to be pulled away from the present like a kite,

to and fro,

nostalgia and hope,

I’m constantly crafting places of refuge for my deluge of unwanted thoughts.

They live in the past and future: things I have no control over.

‘Who am I really?’

‘I mean, what the hell am I doing,

no... I mean where the heck am I actually going with my life?’

I feel the pressure building in my chest and head,

but I choose not to give in,

I tackle my emotion to the ground of my heart,

and pin it down with all my strength.

‘Not now, not today,

you’ve got work to do.’