I no better know myself
Than I would the weight of the moon
If I could hold it in my hand.
I can no better control myself
Than a wildfire three days away
The smoke only now in my nose.
I live with myself like mice
Live with cats and hawks.
In life-and-death hide-and-seek.
I feel like I work for the circus
With clowns and trained animals
Poorly paid and poorly fed.
I love myself like an addict
Loves a drug, if you call that love,
I’m always trying to quit myself.
Nothing makes me happier
Than lying in my bed
And lying in my head.
But something is changing
like a shift in the wind
That fills the sails of a ship adrift.
Sometimes in the night, when it’s quiet
I feel like big things are happening
With no evidence but my pounding heart.
I laugh a little when I have a thought
That’s like nothing I’ve thought before
And it makes me wonder who thought it.
Sometimes I feel like I’m living in a memory
And I don’t know who is remembering it,
But they must be older and wiser than me.
And they know this is the way it goes,
And they find it all absurd and swell,
And I think they like me, as well.
So whoever you are, me, myself, or I
I wish you would stick around
Let me catch a glimpse, hear a sound
Of your voice, of your face
So I might find a place in you
Where I can meet myself anew.