All ON Loan

A Poem by dratsab

poem written in 2020

Our lovers, our cars, even our own bodies don’t belong to us

Our brain is on loan from nature, future nutrients for its other projects

...

Our friends borrowed only a moment to return to work or sleep

Our jobs only ours until we slip up - same with our lovers

Or our lovers or employers just hit the doldrums with us and discard us

Serialized monogamy, fleeting ownership then exchange for another

A car yours until the engine gives out �" same with our body and mind

Home is only your home until you miss rent

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Time and friends will die away �" our time only ours until our time is up

Our towns and safe spots only ours until they undergo renovation or we do

Possessions whittling away as they hide under couches and lost in moves

Items we think we have stored, but can never find are hardly in our control

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Our lives only ours as far as we can control

And what’s in our control?

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Your mind thinks of what it wants �" Regardless of your wish

Your wishes are your wishes why?

You can’t even attempt a try to try if your mind isn’t already in the midst of attempt

Nothing is for sure �" no promise is promised

Your defining skills and traits can evaporate and flee

Your own body is maintained by internal mechanisms and bacteria you can’t even see

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You can’t control what you think you own

All of us �" and every thing - are on f*****g loan

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You control nothing. You own nothing.

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Your memories are malleable, your personality never stays put, your friends are evolving into creatures you don’t recognize, your precarious house can be ravaged by tornadoes and floods and fires, belongings only belong to you until a thief feels compelled to take it for theirs, your body is decaying and melting, your very own hand can be hacked off, your eye and ability to see can be plucked out, your eyesight is inevitably failing anyway… maybe your mental perception as well… your perception of self and others is never sitting still, your trust in others always letting you down to the point you can’t even trust your own judgment, speaking words that others invented and hearing phrases that have been spoken every day.

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Who are you? What if multiple consciousnesses exist within you?

What if thousands see out of the same eyes you do? A million souls sharing one body

Sharing the same brain impulses… all acting/experiencing in unison. What if both your mind and body are a giant hotel and you were misled to believe that you were the only guest?

What if you thought you molded you while your brain misled you - a double agent working for the arbitrary goals of Nature and Universe?

Control, no, but do you even own your own soul?

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Maybe we all live vicarious… in a sense. vicarious innocence