This is how it is, in life, in me
With all that I am and was, all that I will ever be
This is me.

Flowing like a sly snake slithering slowly sideways
Hot sand not touching skin but instead moving aside
For the slickness of my life to leave a telltale s-shaped jagged wound
In the land that I walk, forever doomed by those prophetic words,
“You’ll be a real heart breaker some day,” who knew
The heart that I would break time and again would be
Mine.

No masochist,
Me
Just broken, ever so slightly
You see
This is not the beginning or the end
For life does not work like a movie
Pat top and bottom, clear middle and run-up
Exercise some common sense and realise
That the reality of life is a constant, ever open ‘o’
Of amazing change, amazement itself just another way of saying
‘oops, i did it again’

So this is where i sit now,
Having ‘oopsed’ one time more
This time no more an oops than ever before
But it could be the last one to be made with eyes shut
If I am to make more, they will have to be consciously on purpose
Meaningfully all the more painful for their directed aim
To make me more than I am, once more again,
To turn this sad sourpuss of a future-prefect child
Into the man he needs to be to see this life to its fruitful end
Another aim, this time too high, maybe, but all the same
An aim to me to be what I need for my life to be complete
To be completely happy and comfortable, or at least comfortably happy

Which is one and the same, isn’t it?

So this is my manifesto, that all children come first
That I will make my greatest effort to live by the creed
The creed that is burned in God-like mile-high flaming letters in the darkest corners of my soul
I must “Hurt as few people as little as possible,” and
“Help as many people as much as possible,” for this is life distilled,
Is it not? To be able to say, “I did it my way, and my way hurt so little, and helped so much,
So it must be the right way, for me, at least” and maybe to end it with
“Don’t you see this is as true as mathematical formulae?”
Only to watch others nod sagely, never to know if they agree because you are right
Correct, even, but rather that you are nice, a good soul
And they would not want to let you down on your deathbed.

Saying this before then would be presumptive and arrogant,
Even that they may lie to you to make the last moments all the more meaningful
All the less painful, but you do not need to ask them
For if you do not know, in your heart of hearts
That you have lived your life by your own manifesto
To its fullest extent, the end of the meaning of life,
Your life, will have become something less than what it could have been
And at the end, this is all that will have mattered, you will see.

To be able to look into the eyes of yourself dying
Years from now, and say, “I plan on getting their well,
And dying better” is the most difficult promise we can make, ever
But we owe it to ourselves, don’t we?
To be good is easy, to be really good is easier
But to be Good and Real is the most difficult edge to take in life
The tight rope of sanity and depression, of energy and loss
To always make the right choice because it is the right choice
Not because anyone is watching, or because it suits me
Because some karmic bean counter is watching everything I do
Or because some all-seeing creator is watching my every breath
Or because some all-knowing lord has said it must be so
But because I choose to be that way, knowing full well
That I could be else, have it in me to be the worst of life’s wretched
Creatures, but choose instead to slave away at a life harder to reach
The comfort not given but taken one step at a time, one tear at a time
One slice at a time, one second at a time
One moment in time, and that is all.

each moment counts, make it count, or die trying.

There is nothing more pure than this.