The Nature Of The Problem

A short pondering.

The sand presses through my toes,

As fine as dust, as insubstantial

As the breeze it flees upon.

Wherever it lands,

However,

It merely mingles with the infinite

Number of identical grains

That have fled before it.

Nothing has changed,

Nothing has progressed--

The complete futility of it all

Causes me to pause,

And wonder.

I am nothing more

Than a multi-grained

Imitation of this mindless vacuity;

Except I never had the help of the wind.

I am forever sprinting down a slope,

With my problems, my inadequacies,

Quietly flowing behind me.

Eventually I will exhaust myself,

I will be overtaken,

And I will asphyxiate beneath the weight

Of all my failures and wrongdoings.

If I had the wind at my back,

Perhaps I could convince myself

My surroundings had changed,

That I had escaped--

But that is not the case,

And I never was very good at

Lying to myself,

Anyways.