Into the Muse

Como han pasado los años…

Las casas son Hogares que guardan recuerdos, lagrimas, secretos, alegrías, tristezas…

Caminé por cada habitación una última vez para observarlas y recordar. Me quedé parado un ratito más largo en un espacio del hogar, el que más uso le daba por las mañanas y por las tardes donde muchas veces lo que me sentaba era a reflexionar.

Desalojo, muchos viajes.

Nos sentamos todos a hablar como las reuniones que hacíamos en tiempos de antaño. Reflexionando de cómo los viejos se nos están yendo y cómo los jóvenes no disfrutan lo que nosotros disfrutamos.

¿Qué será de nosotros cuando seamos viejos? ¿Nos irá mal a cargo de las nuevas generaciones?

Extrañaré mucho a esa gente del XX…

Más de cuatro décadas en un hogar entre dos siglos; un sin número de momentos.

Nada dura para siempre, pero ¿por qué tuvo que pasar el tiempo tan rápido?

No había apuro.

Comimos, reímos, cantamos cumpleaños y conversamos ahí una última vez, una última noche…

 

En Corozal andando por un bosque fangoso,

Un monumental Ceiba,

una Catedral del bambú,

Un Viaje lejos en ayuna.

Nos desviamos en Villas La Palma, buscando una tía que por años no la visitaba.

“¿Te acuerdas de mi?”

“Mi niña, ¡que gusto verte!”

Yo la conozco por primera vez, Gloria, sonríe muy profundo, especialmente en el lado derecho

de su rostro.

Le encanta conversar y molestar a su hermana.

Una casa hermosa, pero ella se encuentra sola.

Hace cuatro meses un aniversario más;

desde el 34, nueve décadas y entre mariachis.

Tres derrames corridos; más cuerda que la juventud de hoy.

Me trae memorias de mi abuela y de un profesor;

Espero poder verla otra vez, una Generación

Admiro.

 

Going down the stairs now, Bukowski in my hand, taking him to my library. It’s bittersweet finishing reading his verse.

I want to read some more.

It’s the first whole book of poetry I’ve read, and it was great.

So, real, unadorned.

I place him on top of Today’s Best Nonfiction and Tolkien’s Unfinished Tales.

I like my books and the little library my father left me, to which I have added new copies.

Got me thinking of becoming a librarian like my mother. I wish I could spend more time among books in the New York Public Library or the Library of Congress, submerged in knowledge.

So many things to do in such a short life; unable to, caught up in the absurdities of LIfe.

A life that will soon end, whether I make it to 30 or 95.

Everyone alive today was young once, they had some dreams and excitement to look forward to, and the promise of an afterlife. But the world feels pretty hopeless now, a general sense of nihilism pervades. Some philosophers talk about or say that just because life has no ultimate meaning, it’s not a bad thing because religious folk and atheists can agree that we’re alive.

I don’t know, if life is really meaningless, we ain’t living right, we’re wasting too much time.

At the end of the day, I’m heading up the stairs, stop halfway, gaze at my mother and aunt watching Turkish soap operas again.

Maybe I should sit and watch them with them. To be with them, spend time with them. One day they won’t be there anymore, and I’ll be sad.

Life is hard enough, why must we also be depressed?

If we had money, we could take the whole family on a long voyage. Go see all the wonders of the world.

I guess we shouldn’t think such things. Might add to the depression because it’s not realistic.

I’ve had a lifetime of sadness, and I don’t want to feel it anymore, I want to forget what it feels like.

I thought happier thoughts earlier, but they never last.

Maybe city life, tons going on could help me distract myself better. Real life hustle and bustle walking the streets looking at the buildings and people’s antics. Get out more, do more, walk more.

Her and I we have our arms around each other I squeeze her tight and try to savor the moment that will soon be gone. She’s gone now. She left her clothes on my desk. A wave of sadness hits me as if she was gone, gone.

Nothing is forever, it will all soon be over…

I wonder how old is that beautiful girl staring back at me as I wait in the parking lot. She’s on the me salvé! propaganda wearing a grey t-shirt and ripped jeans. Her smile is lovely. A lady pulls up next to me, complaining about cramping up on the regular.

“Lack of potassium, lack of water,” says the lady next to her, who I assume is her daughter.

The me salvé! girl who went by before, dressed all in black, walks back, this time with two spray bottles in-hand. I guess they have her on clean up duty.

Today’s adventure was about getting steel-toe safety shoes for the blonde. A whole day on such a simple task and $30 for two burgers.

There was a strange boy at the shoe store recording himself doing some strange dance and facial gestures in the mirror. The internet is filled with all that nonsense, but it’s even more bizarre to see it in real life from a boy doing it as it was the most normal thing in the world.

Another boy is sitting across from me, his mother asking him how the shoes fit and his reply. The same scenario playing out before me for the billionth time.

There is no real novelty, these words of mine although mine, are unlikely truly original, as so many before me have likely written similar things.

My mother finally called back, and blondie is here. It’s time to go. It’s time to go live the same moments again and again.

I’m walking again, same old road,

Realizing my life ain’t unique or

special

Nor my experiences.

The older folk round here

Have already done and seen

Many of the things I

am now, just as people in the future will be walking in my shoes.

“Things take on a repeat,” no better way to sum it up, Bukowski.

It don’t take away the fact that life is hell for some, if not all of us.

I sit around all day taking calls, realizing it’s going to be the same type of

calls over and over:

“My kid needs this medication;”

“Why can’t I get my money?”

“Could you spell that, sir?”

“Ask her this!”

It’s all the same. Same calls and situations a million times over no matter the time or place.

No different from moving boxes from place to place in the warehouse all night. Except the warehouse pays better.

Not the future I imagined filled with novelty and my loved ones. Quite the opposite.

Ironic, isn’t it?

Nothing really changes.

“Ain’t nothing new under the sun, eh cousin?”

I remember asking my father to beat me as a child when I realized I had it too good,

he didn’t because he had enough of his own. Like Bukowski he too learned the

meaning of undeserved pain in his early years.

I thought I was being humble asking for a beating so I could give back some of my underserved fortune.

Years later, I still feel underserving, and ever since I have thrown out every piece of good fortune thrown my way.

I get nervous and sad when people try to help me, I feel like I have to pay them back twofold with my billfold or my toil, so I foil.

Even now my letters go unanswered,

but

The one good thing I did was try to clean and sober him up before she saw him; I, self-appointed keeper of the peace.

And now because she wants to keep things in the past, Scarface “I can’t talk to my mother, so I talk to my diary.”

 

Eleven hard years of fighting to find my place in the world and do something, for nothing.

Empty inside, empty all the time.

Walking corpse, pathetic, body keeps going for no reason.

Used to be excited about life, but then life happened,

and I don’t want it no more.

I get you Biggie, I too don’t want to live no more either.

Look at my smile there. I’m not that person no more.

I used to be happy, couldn’t wait to prove myself and make my family proud,

now I pray to God every night for death in my sleep.

Turns out I was always empty inside.

What’s missing? Are you anxious cause you want things to just happen for you overnight and they’re not?

No.

I guess once I really understood that life is meaningless, I died inside.

Some people just feel happiness when they were children. The house looked better, there were presents, lots of hugs and family gatherings. Grandma’s house was never empty. Everything was a celebration.

Time took it all away.

No more glorious gatherings.

No more smiles.

No more footraces.

The old TV; grandma sitting by her sewing machine, gone.

An age of hope….

What became of the girl dressed like Alice?

Time took it all away.

Time, you filthy bastard; you greedy bastard.

Everyone is gone now, either moved away or passed away.

Nothing is the same anymore.

Time took it all away.

The hope is gone, nothing but grey days ahead.

Days I long to be over, so that we can all be reunited and live the same moments again and again as if for the first time.