Sunburned Future
Published July 31st, 2009It is a still, windless night - almost airless. I toss and turn, avoiding my back, wishing the air felt cold. But it does not. It has been dark for hours, but the sun has not yet set beyond my flesh. It burns like a tortured soul.
I take some pills. I was out today, having fun and neglecting my usual worries. I paid too little attention to little things and now I will pay in pain. In the coming days, the sun will exact its price, its pound of flesh from me. I worry, now, about the damage I have done. I am not so young anymore. If I were a pro athlete - just an average one - I’d be nearing the end of my productive life. But I am me and many days I feel like I have yet to actually start my productive life.
Sleep has not arrived here. It is too hot. I am too tired to deal with a wet towel. I can barely move. My heart now - once again - barely beats - smothered by my thoughts and my doubts and my fears. It lies dormant until my soul finds something, someone to nudge it back to life.
The sun is still beating on my back, hours after it has gone on to flare unto the other side of the world. I flounder and await my alarm clock to sound - too soon, too soon. I sit in the middle of the world now - the middle, but not the center, far from the center. I am at phantom crossroads, crossed by phantoms all around me. I need to follow them, one of them (any of them?), but I sit at the bus stop of my life, waiting, sleepless and scorched. I can only hope I will be an ember on the wind, soon. It seems I will not be doused, here, tonight - or quenched - or saved. I have a future. I just cannot see where to go right now. I hope it comes soon, I am tired, sleepy, hot and alone. Not alone. No. But just a little - off…
You’re my hero!