We Are Drowning, How Should We Kill Our Time?

22

 The weight of unused hours burning holes in my palms weight on my shoulders a guilt I carry but can't specify just overlaid over my days my nights always something to be running from Going to bed with untied strings never landing always to do lists spinning in my mind never breathing in all the way never sinking my feet in anywhere all the way all of this running; back home it is all of this running; all of these half-empty tanks of gas operating at full capacity because we cannot admit we are not machines our world is build on facades on pretenses I am so grateful I couldn't hold the weight of a name I am so grateful I couldn't keep up, couldn't fit in quite so well, struggled just enough that it showed instead of being able to tuck it underneath my days with less hours of sleep and more layers of concealer and more coffee cups I am so grateful I fell off the edge of that hamster wheel, the edge where the living starts, I don't understand the things I used to think were necessary and this pounding drum of be somebody be somebody be somebody weighing down my hours so much heavier than I can hold a little respite when I win an award with my degree today and my parents have pride in their eyes but I don't want it anymore the lightness of this moment does not equal the weight of my sleepless nights and clouds of deadlines and cutting into myself instead of cutting into my workload it is a piece of paper that comes in the mail a piece of paper I'll bolt my life to like I bolt it to the wall but instead I'm going to slip out from underneath it slip out from underneath my own face and my own name if I could I don't want the weight of them, I grew up with such a weight to them, I... see it as an arrogance now wrapped in things we are meant to be proud of - the arrogance of thinking you are meant to be somebody even if it's on the shoulders of others, because I know so many smarter people who couldn't afford to spend all their time studying like I could and the weight of success is an unequal weight because some people make leaps and some make only steps to the same place and some could never make a leap at all but we don't see this discrepancy only my name on a plaque I don't want my name on a plaque smoothing over the inequalities saying I am the best (at what? it doesn't feel good) I don't want my name this is what I ran the race for but this isn't the finish line it's just a start of another one and I want to land, to land, to land, to breathe all the way in even if it means I watch my hours fall through my fingertips with my accolades; I was always told I would be so much - and my ghost stands taller than me I cannot keep up with her running ahead she doesn't even know the right way