The city's lighting up. Racing through the backroads, my mind's alive.

High, in the lowest place.

Through the dark, all I see is blue.

And you. Somewhere else.

Somewhere new.

I don't know what's out there. Past the crevice.

I travel the streets. Searching. When I turn the corner there's always someone new.

I make another wrong turn.

It's exhausting being on foot this long. In the sanctimonious quiet, I sip sangria on a side street. Cars go by. No speed limit. I lean back, relaxing my shoulders, holding my head high. Where should I go? Thoughts pass me by. I acknowledge them. Some acknowledge me. We're not on equal footing in here. I ask for directions.

"You, over there," I say to the fellow at the table across from me.

He doesn't acknowledge me.

"Hello? I'm talking to you,"

He looks over at me, unimpressed.

"What? What do you want? I'm busy," He says. With no other people on the street, the sound of his clinking glass as he takes a sip seems to echo everywhere.

"Where are you going?" I ask.

"Excuse me?"

"I mean, what direction are you headed in?"

He sips his beer, looking out at the street.

"Graduate school probably. Maybe a Masters program. At least, that's what you're thinking,"

I sigh in exasperation.

"I need to know how to get there. Can you be more specific?"

"Is that where your going?" He replies in an incredulous tone, unconvinced.

I lean back in the chair, looking up at the twinkling of all the nerve endings shooting off across the hollows of my mind.

"I don't know. I don't know. I just...I just want to go home,"

"Okay, where's home?"

"I don't know" I say. A mind without a home is the sea without a shore.

"But I can hear my name. Somewhere. Sitting on someone's tongue. They don't even know they're gonna say it yet. But I know! Somehow I just know that they will, and it feels like the truth and I may have some doubt but I don't question it I just accept it. I can feel it, farther than I can see it,"

He looks at me.

"Really? 'Cause I don't hear anything," He says dryly, looking away.

"It's not...it's hard to explain, okay?"

I busy myself with another Sangria that the waiter brings me. The timing is sublime.

The man across from me looks annoyed, but doesn't move to leave.

"Okay, so..."

"Uh, what do you mean?" I ask, momentarily confused.

"What are you going to do?" He asks, standing up.

"Well, I thought I might take the bus," I say, motioning over my left shoulder in the direction of the deserted bus stop.

The man starts laughing.

"Oh, no no no. You can't do that." He says, using his cane to skirt some pebbles on the cobblestone ground.

I frown, not comprehending.

"Why not? That's how people get places around here, isn't it?"

He shakes his head, his smirk never leaving his face.

"No one takes the bus," He says matter-of-factly.

"Why not?"

"Because it won't run,"

"Why?"

"Because the driver hasn't made up his mind," He says in a tone that suggests he's reasoning with a child and failing miserably.

"Are you kidding?" I say sharply.

He stops in the middle of the street, turning to face me.

"No, no I'm quite serious. The bus doesn't run until the driver makes up his mind," He says, turning back onto his path and crossing the street.

"Wha...makes up his mind about what?" I ask, following him down the empty intersection. The tapping of his cane makes up for the empytiness that fills the streets.

"About where he's going. He hasn't made up his mind yet,"

"Really? And when is that supposed to happen?"

"No one knows."

"Well, how long has it been since it stopped running?" I ask, baffled.

"A few years, maybe more,"

"Great, great." I say, sarcastically, almost shouting the words. I feel so desperate, and I surprise myself by sitting right where I am and breaking down into sobs.

In the street. In public. In anger and frustration.

"Calm down, it's not that upsetting."

"I thought you left," I said.

"No," He looks off for a minute, smiling, looking older than he appears to be for that minute.

"It's funny. I did leave for a while. But then, somehow, I wound up back here again. I came back. On the street, trying to figure this out too,"

I tried to stop crying.

"Look, I've been lost before and I'm fine. I never stay lost for very long anyway. But I think, you need to find a way, or something. Here, take this,"

I look up. He holds out key on a keychain. It jingles.

I take the key hesitatntly. There's a pause while I examine it.

"Yes, I'm pretty sure there's a parked car nearby somewhere. It's a Subaru, nothing fancy. It could help you."

"You, don't know where it is?" I ask, surprised.

"No. I mean, there's only so much that I can know. But maybe you could find it,"

"Thank you," I say, after a minute. It feels like a precious gift.

"See you later,"

He departs down an alleyway, footsteps receding into the darkness.

I feel scared, scared to be here in the dark. The streetlights dimly light the cobblestones, but the warmth of the car makes me hopeful. It warms me up to think of it, as the night's so cold. So I walk on, toward what I know, spinning the key on my right index finger.

Somehow, I feel a little more at home.

A curious notion sets itself, quickly infecting my mind.

In every quarter. On every surface.

Stop, stop this dopamine flow. Too much of a good thing isn't good at all.

From one light touch the chaos unravels itself quickly, stirring hidden thoughts that I try to refrain from. I can't contain them. They're everywhere.

Emotions boiling over, rising to the surface, burning my cheeks.

Embarrasing.

It's a whisper, hardly in the blood, hovering. Waiting, its grip distresses me.

Cardiac arrest a breath away, self-control is paramount. But I'm not good at that.

At least, not right now.

I breath in, releasing a tremor. My body's afflicted.

I think, I'm undone.

A merciless plague runs rampant through my thoughts, the fault of my affections.

It's hard to hear myself. Formerly strong, now weak and slightly insane.

This isn't me. I'm possesed.

God exercise these demons out of me.

They're clawing away at my conscious sanity, tearing pieces of my peace away.

Everyday. When I see him.

My heart murmurs so loudly, but I heart my secrets.

It's ringing in my hearts.

My hearts throbbing.

I can't help myself.

My mind was free.

But now I'm a minor character in this tragedy.

Someone's gonna write me off this show, 'cause I'm long gone already.

And I'm hoping, and I'm wistfully stealing a glance.

Just look my way.

See me in the crowd. See me looking at you.

Ruin me...and...

I know we'll never happen. I see that. The truth isn't blind to me.

But I can't stop what you started.

So I'll sit back in my desk chair, and

I'll try to smother the fire that's ablaze in my mind.

Kindling my desires, lighting up my dreams.

I'll keep dreaming.

Through the roses, I emerge. 

Still budding, a wasted dream. Still floating. 

Vines hug the garden wall, reaching for heaven. 

But we're way below.  

I surrender. Time doesn't stop. Nothing does.    

Past the dark, at the end of the track.  

The infinite's a stare at my back. 

My shoulders tense. 

In each thought, my fingers reach for words.

Where they end, I begin. 

We breathe it in. Say something back. 

Pretty speech, I kindle the flames. 

They warm my cheeks. But it burns out. 

I circle back. 

Cast away, passing vessels give me hope. 

Or they doom me here. 

I can never tell which. 

Our conversations setting, becoming a memory.

Fine thoughts into sea foam, you set sail.

The sun's gone, do I let you leave?

Do I want you to stay?

Sentiments for the wise. Not for me. 

Last ditch effort. I shoot off a flare. 

You laugh at my joke.

I smile.

Embers light up the night. 

Should I be granted the truth in my own heart....maybe someday. I don't know. I glisten in the wind, an apparition of ambitions yet to be realized. Thoughtful, but truly thoughtless in a world of a million people. A million hearts, beating at all once. I'm hopeless, in a world that will spin on and one without me. Without them. Fleeting moments of love escaping through my fingers, in the present but fading into the past.

I am...at a loss. Love holds the fabric of my consciousness into tangible and coherent pieces of a mind, that now dwindle. Set adrift. Flowing past happy truths and distant memories. Past my parents. Fleeing the inevitable. But I can't escape it. 

I can't escape me. 

I am a trapped vessel, tethered to the earth by irrationality and reason all at the same time. Love leading me on, into joy, into tragedy. Beating me, breaking me, swaying me into submission. Because if not for them, what am I? who am I? Without these feelings, where do I exist within myself? 

I am...trembling on a fine line of blissful ignorance and conscious mortality. What lies in between? Where do I exist in this no man's land? Near my coffin, do I linger? Do I stay? Is that all I see?  I'll turn away from it, but I'll have to turn right back again someday. Sometime. 

Listless. fingertips. 

longingly reaching. 

Shadows.

of who you are. far from me.

wanting. wary. but

hope promises everything.

the sea whistles.

Our name. 

a blur.

Sun on my lips. I'm adrift.

Sand glitters through

stormy shores, swelling in

my chest.

The heat is unbearable.

High tide, low expectations.

Love?

My heart crashes in waves.

I wish...

I wish he-

Salt on my cheeks, flushed. 

Away from the sand.

forlorn. memory fresh. stinging.

you've sailed away. 

The sun blinds, but

the truth.

is. 

I could see.

you didn't want.

Somebody.

anger, warms the night

but 

It's cool in my bed.

Chords of melancholy, rise with the sun

drifting into

thoughts full of sleep

I wake to the sound 

That sweet melody is 

always the same

I can't help but hope

if I stay, another day

the loneliness will go

why can't I go

Smiling faces, so elusive

hands always empty

no one holds them

I curl them up as I caress the familiar notes

of the song I know, hands reaching out

crying, trying, to get through

why can't I go

The song begins to fade as I

fall asleep

Fantasies of 

laughter

love

pulsing, beating like they're real 

running free, seeing

the moonlight's ethereal glow

warms a cold body

I drift away

longing, searching, wanting to feel

something good

a small place, or a safe space

an oasis

a sweet dream

The music stops.