2:10 a.m.

It’s a constant preoccupation: whether we’re living up to our promise

Those middle-of-the-night reflective assessments of the promises you made to yourself

And wondering, perhaps praying for the promise of another day

Why do we celebrate those who succeed, yet we look over those who continue to try,

those who continue to believe in their promise?

 

4:30 a.m.

What’s the difference between a salty mariner and a dung beetle?

An adventuresome hero or the toiling Everyman?

Both roles suitably casted for me (really, for everyone)

And the seconds and minutes and hours of the day

are counted off to give meaning as I make a stand and

shoulder the weight of those promises I have whispered to myself

nearly each and every night

 

Sisyphus is a hero because he readily shoulders his burden each day

knowing he will not fulfill his promise by sunset; and so,

I’m trying to determine whether I’m tossing on open seas or sifting in a sandbox

Whether I’m smiling at a foreboding horizon or obsessively rolling my shit?

 

6:50 a.m.

Which is it: a tragic figure

Or the hero of my own comedy?

Is it steely determination

Or quiet desperation

that overwhelms me at sunrise?

 

– Chris George

May 2020