The Miles and the Minutes

There's nothing to write
but  desperate jokes
there's nothing to do but
freeze in here and try to think,
but now I just forget things,
so that's complicated too.

Stranger, they give you the minutes,
but you earn the miles,
and soon enough you get your wings,
but you don't know your way to the sky,
so you keep jumping off things
that are high.

I know about that pain.

And that's where you and I
are alike;
You
feel that all your miles were used up in a minute,
and I feel
like all my minutes
were used up, looking out the window
as mile after amazing mile
went by.

So there goes another old
kindly soul
with the phospherous burning in his eyes,
another faintly praised and questionable prize,
a ray of light but in a dull sunrise

Reader, if you only knew
how hopelessly i'm situated,
you might not feel obligated
by the bounds of civility,
but I'm trusting you.