allmostrelevant

To Know

The moment.
The moment of clarity.
The severity,
a rarity
that stings
and rings
with things
you can’t describe,
but only feel
and know
—you just know—
what will happen,
and that you can’t
stop it
no matter how hard you try.
For better or for worse,
you lie to yourself
and say
I see the light;
another way.
I will fight!

Yet, you know.
You just know
that you’re only distracting yourself,
and falling back
into the very same moment
of clarity
which trapped you before,
and you know,
you just know
that you’ve been here before—
you’ve seen it,
you’ve felt it,
and now it is here
and is all you can see,
and you know,
you just know
it is all that can be,
and you slip

—Oh, you slip—
and you fall
to your knees
and say, If only
that moment of clarity…
hadn’t shown itself,
hadn’t spoken to me,
hadn’t consumed
then until now
in the wink of an eye,
so that months of inaction
have rolled on by
with nothing
more than the words
“Why couldn’t I…”

But you knew.
You just knew
when your future
appeared
that it would hold you,
entrance you
with its mysterious face,
so you watched
and you listened,
running in place,
when all it would take
to avoid that path
is to speak out
and say “No,
this can’t pass!
That isn’t my fate!”

…but you couldn’t,
you wouldn’t
want to leave it to chance;
take a risk
give her a kiss,
when at that moment’s glance
you cannot be together,
but she’s still in your life,
and to you that’s still better
than ‘maybe’ or ‘might,’
and you want nothing more
than to cherish that moment,
to keep what you can,
to hold onto the light;
even if only
a flash in the pan.

When the future finds you
and you don’t agree,
it takes all that you have
to let go of that moment,
and what used to be,
and accept the tears of its clarity.