Mahogany Tinder Box

One cannot help, at the earliest junctures

but express unabashed idealism.

From here the path diverges.

One becomes a cynic, the other...

having known nothing but their own shadow's comfort

sets a course for familiar, 

for safety,

convention.

Nothing can parse the validity of either

as each outlook serves a master

who lives in a tinder box

in some attic

in the midwest

marked with the solitary word, "past"

No gale wind can effect movement on a mountain

and no logic can pry loose the weight of days

which lead to weaks, onto months, years, and even decades

one learns, every moment, of every day 

evolving (if fortune wills it) to an ideal self

unindered by attatchments, to what which appears to be the norm

of course nothing in this tango will ever matter much

to the mob of the masses

nor the ego,

denid for a lifetime, or two or a quantitiy measured like a baker

as dozens of 13

because there is a pattern, a mold

where what ever is harnessed is meant to be sold

or bartered

this thing, as abstract as can be understood

yet concrete enough to have served as foundation

in terms not measured in time

but in effort,

and good will, 

and a senseless defiance.

These here are words. not mere reflections

of eight hour shifts, nor predictors of 

comfort, nor outstretcehed arms. No these words have meaning,

and any person who understands that theres a point where the bridge meets water,

yet turns away. 

Maybe this person has found what others have sought.

or, it could be, that comfort trumps freedom

among all but the mad ones.

or it could be, that logic trumps opportunity

whatever the case... one constant remains.

One plus one equals two,

except of course, in those instances where the sum yields three.