Not Just on the Weekends

Wake Forest, North Carolina

Perfection is

Waves along a shoreline

Warm November sun

Coral-colored maple leaves

And the crunch of quartz and dirt

Beneath my feet

I step away, though

And the thoughts return

Perfection is in the moment

And extends forever

Even beneath rejection

I find myself wandering through the forests

And the wild

Jealous of the creatures I see

Their lives

Are free

This squirrel

Just had the coolest jungle gym of a tree

To romp through

Meanwhile,

I’m due to go to Wegmans

So I can make food for the week

So I can sit efficiently

Staring at a screen

Sitting in the same spot

For eight hours

Missing the entirety

Of the daylight

And left with artificial light at night

And naught to do

But laze comfortably away

On a couch

The fuck kind of existence is this

When I could be parkouring my way

Through the woods

When I could be holding sacred dialogue

As a holly tree

With my siblings nearby

As we create the forest

Together

Perfection,

Indeed.

But this Faustian bargain

With a laptop

And with technology

May be the closest to perfection I can get

In my current colonized state

Grateful I am

But I still long to create the forest together

With the squirrels and the birds

And the hollies and the maples

And the wind and the waves

And not just on weekends.