23 Emotions: Altschmerz

(repeat)

a record,

the same groove over and over

(and over and over)

wearing a canyon into the vinyl.

same same

our twins "both alike in dignity"

as with you - it is with me (too)

my friend.

in this darkest time of the year,

you nipping close at my heels,

heed not the dark thoughts,

in those extra hours.

o sister

I'm weary of this circle

(as are you, I know)

this dusty groove we shuffle in...

I will blow out your candles this year.

Altschmerz

n. weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had—the same boring flaws and anxieties you’ve been gnawing on for years, which leaves them soggy and tasteless and inert, with nothing interesting left to think about, nothing left to do but spit them out and wander off to the backyard, ready to dig up some fresher pain you might have buried long ago.

36.00000...

   Gulls pinwheel above me,
   my bike sails smoothly along the sun warmed tarmac.

   Islands hold memories,
   even unfamiliar ones, not yet made.

   The surf is quiet, subdued,
   an outer reflection of what's within.

   Three times a teenager.

   They say the Pacific has no memory,
   but I do...

   Travel blurs the edges of reality rubbed raw,
   smoothed like so many pebbles on the beach.

   The loneliness of intentional solitude,
   a single star among so many.

   Learning to walk backwards...


   They say the Pacific has no memory,
   but I do...