Creator / imaginer: Dabbler in art, literature and sound.
I no longer remember how I once felt,
When my skin was smoother,
My mind was unweighted by worry,
When misery had yet to touch,
Her sorrowful hand
To my cheek.
I no longer remember,
The warm embrace
of the morning sun
On my face.
As I once did,
When the music played,
And my family
Laughed together
As one.
A sadness fell upon me this evening,
A heavy wave of confusing memories,
I was laughing at a comedy with my wife,
Only 10 minutes before it hit me,
As I sat alone, I felt such a feeling of loss,
Where did it come from?
A momentary look at a photo of an Atari 2600 console,
Someone was selling it online,
It was dust-covered, scratched, and time-beaten,
The sales caption brought a tear to my eye,
It read, “old, but still in working order”,
My sadness was about aging and about my own relevance,
It hit me like a body shot to the liver with a lead pipe,
Because I too feel a little dusty, antique, and I have my scars,
For I’ve also been beaten by life quite a few times,
But I am still here, and although I am not perfect,
I am still in working order.
As I have aged, it feels like I am falling,
I’m slower, less enthusiastic, unwilling to connect,
Everything hurts, the body joints and the mind aches,
The younger me was more combative, stronger, fireier,
As if I followed an invisible upward trajectory,
But now, I can feel myself falling uncontrollably,
Piece by piece, day by day, I’m disappearing,
I feel I’m at the point where I’m in my own way,
And constantly in the way of others, my fire isn’t as bright,
It doesn’t burn with the same intensity as it once did,
I’m falling now, perhaps back to earth,
Maybe, after a life with my head in the clouds,
I’m finally coming down to rest, to sleep,
To truly sleep for the first time,
Dream free.
Why does part of me always seek the harshest feelings?
Why am I never content when I am at rest?
Peace arrives, but never lingers.
It is as though my mind searches endlessly
For darker paths to follow,
Unable to remain still,
Unable to be calm and content.
A relentless pursuit haunts my sleep
And shadows my waking hours.
I do not want it.
I do not welcome it.
Yet it remains.
I seek comfort in the hunt for things that bring me pleasure,
While some hidden part of me knows
That one day they will be beyond my reach.
So I collect.
I stockpile.
I obsess.
I spend.
I continue the hunt.
Everything is catalogued.
Everything is placed in perfect order.
Everything except me.
I see darkness gathering on the horizon,
And I fear the grey days it may bring.
I am no longer certain
That I possess the strength
To walk that long road back into the light.
I do not want that future,
Yet it feels inevitable.
I resent the persistence of time
And the silent murders it commits.
Time is never held accountable.
It stands before no court
And answers for none of its crimes.
Lifespan, not death itself,
Is the true ticking bomb within the mind.
There is no turning back,
Only a subtle pushing forward
By unseen hands.
Dark days may be coming.
I do not want them.
Yet still they approach.
After a bad day today, I sat reminiscing about simpler times, about my youth,
When music was king, and most of what I did revolved around it,
I’d slide a record from its sleeve, put it on the turntable and sit back,
Nothing felt rushed, dreams felt ripe and reachable, and the music played,
Occasional trips to a record store, when they were plentiful and local,
Gazing at album covers, putting up posters, and reading lyrics, while the music played,
Bands influenced the way I dressed, the way I thought, music was everywhere,
My pride and joy, a silver Akai sound system, it was everything, it made my music play,
It was my best trade ever, a carton of beer, for the soundtrack to my teen years,
It’s something that I’ve tried to recapture later in life, but the joy isn’t quite the same,
New bands don’t offer the same appeal as they once did, when did I become so cynical,
However, like a time machine, my turntable takes me back to when the music played,
To when the air of life itself felt charged with electricity, music, and endless possibilities.
I have an internal feeling, like a counting clock ticking away,
Creeping nearer, time is the predator, and I am its prey,
If there’s a good thing coming, it will be the first that I’ve seen,
Because misfortune and sorrow now live where I’ve been,
I feel out of control which I just cannot stand,
I feel my heart in my throat, and brain on remand,
Anxiety for my future remains powerfully crippling,
It toys with my brain poking, prodding and tickling,
Who is this hunter that stalks me these days,
As I grow greyer, fatter, sadder and more dismayed,
I once felt stronger, in command of my thoughts,
But anxiety has filled my mental account full of naughts,
A life full of death and mental illness, has my mind leaving me,
A watered-down version of the man I should be,
No self-esteem, and so much worry and woe,
That when I look in a mirror, I see a face I don’t know.
What happened to me, and where did I go,
That counting clock reminds me, we reap what we sow.
I cross my front garden to my favourite tree and sit down,
She has a thick leaning trunk and a beautiful green crown,
Soft grass at her base, welcomes my feet like an old friend,
The queen tree is the kind, a younger me would often ascend,
I’d climb to the top and feel the sun on my smiling face,
Above the world in her castle, my secret green hiding place,
Times have changed, and now I must admire her from below,
My bare feet in the grass, and the greying face of an old fellow.
Well, here we are again, a new day, a new week, a new outlook,
The back of my mind wonders, ‘more from of the same old handbook?’,
There is a self-expectation that things will be better this time,
But each new day seems more energised than this mind if mine,
So, I make coffee, I pen these words, and I start to feel better,
I shuffle, not run at my morning, coffee’s the fuel in my carburettor.
I’m like an older car now, that takes more effort to start each morning,
I need to start with low revs, to avoid a red engine light warning,
I must be gentle and kind to my brain or I’ll suffer for it later,
Because there’s no roadside assist if I drive myself into a crater.
My engine’s still ok, but the bodywork certainly has a few dents,
I’m practiced at my job, and I can deal with what it presents,
I must remember I’m an older car now, and not a young spaceship,
So I strap in and slowly set out on this week’s mental road trip.
