not it
i think i’m getting back into it. the it. back into life.
i’m trying anyway. why do i lose it every so often? why can’t it stick with me?
are we playing tag? tag with it? with life?
not it! life glees. i seek for it. i’m so tired of seeking for it.
i’m tired of chasing it like a finish line
that keeps sliding farther down the track.
i’m tired of sprinting.
i think i keep mistaking stillness for absence.
when the air goes quiet
i assume life has slipped out the back door,
left me mid-sentence.
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but maybe it’s just sitting
cross-legged in the corner,
waiting for me to notice
that it doesn’t always shout.
maybe it’s not meant to be caught. or gotten into.
i keep thinking life is somewhere else —
a louder version,
a brighter draft,
a self i haven’t unlocked yet.
but what if the quiet isn’t an intermission.
what if it’s the whole scene.
what if life is the pause
between wanting and having,
between asking and answer,
between the echo and the next word.
and maybe the reason it won’t stick
is because it isn’t glue.
it’s more of weather.
it moves through me,
around me,
sometimes heavy, sometimes bright,
never owned.
maybe i don’t get back into life.
maybe i stop stepping out of it
every time it grows quiet.
maybe i let the quiet,
the not quite,
count.
