half-blind

I just don’t know, can’t really say,
Just the way it goes, just another day,
There’s no moral to this story,
Nothing to learn, nothing of worth,
Just living somewhere between death and birth.
Want to hit the open road, leave this behind,
Explore the world, see what we can find,
But anchored to this place, weighed down,
No chance of escape, too late to repent,
Burdened by money not yet earned but already spent.
Promises made and promises broken,
Littering the path travelled, so much unspoken,
Falling further and further behind,
When will we ever catch up, ever break even,
Just need to maintain, keep our options open.
Trusting others patience, trusting us just the same,
Unlikely to pay, unlikely to stay in the game,
Playing by someone else’s rules,
What propels me forward, what do I believe,
Hanging on barely, waiting for relief.
Expectations overblown, not just my own,
Friends traveling so far away from home,
Cannot determine the import to my son,
Wait and see, see how it goes,
I’m not so sure he yet knows.
Our everyday struggle to live in this world,
Pledging allegiance to ancestors, no flag unfurled,
Trying to remain true to the real, to reality,
Breaking the fetters placed upon us by the outside,
By people who choose not to live, but to hide.
Chasing after false idols, empty things,
Not realizing what pain all that brings,
The material world nothing but illusion,
Here for a moment, lives barely a blip,
We hold tight, not wanting to lose our grip.
Sages, poets and prophets down through the years,
Have claimed to know, have played on our fears,
Some may have glimpsed the eternal, the void,
Some may have heard a murmur, felt a flutter,
Understood we are all connected to one another.
So our struggle individually and collectively,
To live in these two worlds simultaneously,
The spiritual and the material, as best we can,
Getting caught up from time-to-time,
Walking the razor’s edge half-blind.