Part 47

I don’t have the answers. But most deliberation
is rhetorical, isn’t it? Is this life well-lived? How
good should a good poem really be? What if
Icarus had never tried to fly? But you dare to
ask about failure. About rejection. It takes a
lifetime to solve abandonment. I can list my
mistakes. By severity. By consequence. By
date. By regret. I can find things to blame.
Beyond a god, beyond physics. I want to say
despite, still, even though. Words that taste
like cement dust, sticking to the roof of my
mouth. When I reached the Cliffs of Moher, a
thick fog covered everything. Cold, damp, not
a glimpse of rock or sea or sky, as if something
had bitten off one edge of the world. Isn’t a
lot of life just like that? Opaque? Ill-timed? A
function of disconsolate variables? Like us.
Ordinary. Incomplete. There are no reasons to
wake up. There are no reasons to continue.
There are no prizes for winning. You find a
level that is just enough. That works as long
as the tea is warm. That is good for a couple of
verses. That is as short as a long sigh. Enough.
Despite god. Despite physics. Despite the mist.
Seeing enough though there is nothing visible.
Living enough though it counts for nothing, at all.

(County Clare, Ireland)