ghosts find their way by my side on my subway ride here - home - queens, ny - from the apothecary where i write prescriptions for tyrone's left eye that was shot off when he crossed the line of boy to man at 12, in our junior high that sits like a landmine in the crevices of conversation when i am asked about the past.
the bitter past sits with the bleak future, both scratching themselves into scriptures i live by when i am not awake.
most of the time i am sleep walking, slipping into somnambulistic talk of Being and Nothingness like a sufi, except i am in the frame of sartre, riding nihilism like a skater rolling ferociously down that 100-story sky scraper that curves out, in grand central, across bryant park, behind the monday night summer movies that i just missed and lament over and over again until i am holding my head in the last subway car on the Q, in the seat reserved for the handicapped, and grow crippled in my inability to shift the stories that begin to sound like the lyrics and tone of 'fast car' by tracy chapman that the musician on the platform at union square played like he wrote it, like he wanted out and i sang along not knowing it wasn't my song.
i want out too, from these stories that i made up so that there could be a way in to times square spectacles, and morning side heights ivy columbia university intellectuals, and on the battle stage of club-pyramid on avenue a n 7th st, where rappers slay one another to the finish, and the desi dub clubs that i made up in my mind and still believe exists but i'm never invited too.
missed breakfast lunch and dinner again today, missed the notes of fried dough and eggs, missed jessica and mahi's thursday night party, missed the sneaker sale, the one for the new jordans, that stick-up-kids have been pulling out cold steel for. missed it and didn't want to miss a thing like the way i would stay glued to tv, to breaking bad, to friday night, in case i'd miss out.
miss out.
miss out. your fly but... i'm cool. real cool. got to smell good for ALLAH. gotta path to walk on. hope we can walk together. hope our paths are siamese. hope to see you there.
missing out, brings me Closer. reminds me the past that sits like ghosts in my ears are demons that lend voice to decisions that paint my future into a two-dimensional facebook picture where everyone is smiling. tyrone and junior high are gone, juan, willie and high school, gone, college gone, 20's gone, eighties, nineties, two thousands...
miss out. it's okay. it's more than okay. miss out and Work. shhh...
I'm dancing in a dim lit room. Spinning and spinning in slow motion. Going no where...my face reads delight and satisfaction and yet I feel frustrated that I'm dancing and going no where. The smile on my face slowly fades to uncertainty. When will I stop? Dancing reminds me of the world I use to belong to. The world in which I miss so much. At times, I stare out the window and remember a past that breathe such life and joy. A life in which dancing spoke of love and promise. As I keep dancing in this dimly lit room, I wonder how much I've missed out. Missed out on opportunities, missed out on the simple pleasure of just being me. Dancing and dancing and yet going no where.
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