Poem No. 5: Pity

Squandering is hard. 
I'd like to believe  
you know this,
but I'm not so sure.

We make it seem
easy. To entertain - 
to be entertained - 
to pleasure - 
to feel pleasured
by another,
through warmth
by conversation
through settling in 
common ground,
to have the opportunity
for boredom to become
friendship, the best
present of them all,
an honor that requires
nothing to give,
nothing to take.

(Because you won't
find it if you're not looking.
Stillness is a movement 
that allows for nothing 
to happen, to really 
happen so we can turn 
our insides out. And 
later, laugh real laughs 
at the soul-carrying face.
So it's hard to find fellow
squanderers when no one 
looks. But luckily
for me, I can name a few.)

Though I've squandered alone.
It's against your rules, but
tell me, is squandering so
different than daydreaming?
Staring out into space,
thinking, forgetting where
you are in wondering without
thought, in feeling the simple
fact of existing: asking that 
question: Am I really here?
I know, for some, that causes
fear. It never did me. I 
like pure sentience. And 
playing with it. Like light
through fingertips, like
a song emanating from 
my mouth, but not knowing 
from where. What is a 
mouth? A song?

I don't know 
in this instance
how to speak directly
to your musings on
production, waste,
excess, punishment,
time pre-spent (to what end?)
Capital, wealth, and
decadence.. the sun.

But (I think)
I get it, and 
I know
I like it.
I'll be able
to speak to it
one day. You 
said something 
about cooking?
I don't really
know how.
Were there days
we just found food?
To burn, to eat.

I'm aware of
oxygen thieves (as a
teacher used to say):
when a body stays
as merely a refusal 
of anyone else being there,
I wonder why?
To that lie 
I'm sorry for this truth:
how sad.