Everything is moving, all the time, too fast to keep up,
Too much to keep track.
If it was just a bit slower?
Just a bit less-?
Just a bit…what?
What more?
It’s the way of the world, isn’t it?
Time passes. Things change.
Natural.
“Adapt.” “Grow.” “Learn.”
The world is shifting around me,
and I am frozen in time.
This everchanging landscape
I am compelled to traverse.
But I am clinging to the familiarity
of the ponds
and the lakes
and the oceans.
The little puddles of consistency.
The marks of permanence.
The shelter from what lies ahead.
As if I avoid the land it will become less scary.
As if the more I abstain,
the more willing it will be to welcome me.
As if I can stay in the water and not drown;
make a home in the stagnant shallows,
or the guiding flow of the currents.
I know… I know
it will be harder the longer I wait.
That I won’t just wake up and be able
to navigate this foreign land.
That I cannot learn the landscape
if I don’t go out and get a map.
But I cannot bring myself to follow
the paths that are presented to me,
and I am too afraid to forge my own.
I am treading water.
I am too afraid to swim
and if stop…
I may sink.