Zdzislaw Beksinski
There is nothing merciful
About these silent departures
For I know neither the source
Nor what manner of apology
Is required to make amends
(if indeed an apology would serve)
Did I return to my fortifications
Withholding my affections
As a miser calibrating his fortune?
Perhaps I never left my tower
And you, curious of the spectacle within
Happened briefly upon my window
Withdrawing only on admission
Did I refuse to come outside
Despite your best intentions?
Or did my nakedness invite rejection?
I do not know if my exertions
Extend beyond my anxieties
If I struggle with individuals
Or merely with the stereotypes
Of society in a more generic sense
Perhaps I think of myself alone
The breath, the progression, the dalliance
Perhaps I am more actor than student
More dreamer than industrialist
I doubt I’ve set one neuron
Outside since conception
I might even be a letter penned
In darkness by one who has concluded
That we are all just machines to freedom
(Can anyone claim autonomy of thought or deed?
Even spontaneity is premeditated for effect )
I am not different enough
To claim another species
And yet all novelty seems
Taboo when first encountered
We learn so much less from success
Success being a script
And so rarely a measure of value
Given the methods of attainment
I think we must be in purgatory
Why else would we repeat
The abominations of our histories?
Perhaps there is a fundamental flaw
In our records, to let the victor alone speak
Does it not assume of gluttony, virtue?
*
I don’t usually write down my stream of conscious thoughts because usually they don’t make any sense but today that is precisely what I did haha
mindlovemisery 