You Don’t Live in This World
by Paula Kubacka
But you will love and collect, and beg that it will be enough.
You will never live like they do. Your time is always stolen, taken by shaky hands and lost with every unsure breath. You will never live like they do, though you will die pretending. Even your last thought will be of the almost-life you mimicked to lead.
“What was the difference?” You will ask. “Between life led and life I never had?”
And the voice you’ve known your entire life will not reply.
Your pitiful pretence will spend all that time (it’s running out, are you aware?) trying to prove its worth. You will cling to the ideal of experience, you will even lie that you can feel. Then, your pathetic make-believe will write it down and hoard it in that box of yours, a fantasy you will move with you, each time changing places and people.
You will deceive yourself to the point of delusion. You will forget you don’t live in this world – that it’s not yours to live – that you were meant to leave. You will live and collect and love, and beg that it will be enough.
And it will be, for you will live.
RevUU 