Whether wished or woeful, the words still seem to will their way. To me, or through me- to you, whoever, wherever you are. But the clouds of my own sentience seem to shroud what should be said. If anything even should.

Is hope the only herald we hold, or is it but the poison from which the internal rot works its way outward?

Does purpose need to be grand? Is it simplicity that I fear? The idea of settling? Must every soul get tamed by time, or otherwise face some cataclysmic demise?

Mayhap I’ve spent too much time as my secret identity. A falsified version of self to better serve the whims of a society in decay- while each day, the villains feel less a need to don their mask of altruism, feeling more free to be at one with malevolent intentions? Every year of my life, the masses have less, and less- while the growingly wicked few gain more unstoppable proportions. There are even weak-minded portions of various populations that rhyme their superficial praise with what appears to be the foundations of worship.

Forgive me, if you would. I was rather ill-tempered earlier. Believe it or not, anger can often flow in and about me with a natural ease. And within the confines of negative emotion, the spiral flies downward with a swiftness that gravity couldn’t even manage to pull. And when the walls of the pit prevent periphery, the power to escape the circumstantial containment of existence grows ever elusive.

But the fall only goes on as long as you let it. And so often, our stumbles make it seem as though the ground beneath has vanished. Yet the smoke and mirrors of our minds are a trick that can be dismissed, once you realize that the slight of hand is often of our own design. That isn’t to say that bad, even horrible things don’t happen. For only the most ignorant of beasts would believe that every thing is as it should be and proceeds without assistance to the brighter days still to dawn ahead. For while it is not us who makes this world of ours turn, it is within us- this species- growing ever out of our rudimentary mire via the might and malleability of our mentalities.

I spoke a few days ago, to a friend. And if you’re lucky (or attentive) enough, your story might find a few characters like this in your own tale. But this friend, a member of your narrator’s found family- I told him, a confession, almost, that most nights I go to bed with sadness only to wake hungover with the melancholy of the earthly spin prior. It is, perhaps, a more default setting than I would like to admit. But be that as it may, our conversation continued, the skirmish against sorrow is not one won without an effort. And while the battle of each day might seem difficult and drenched in dread- the war is a story constituting the length of our lives. And that progress is not instantaneous. Often times it goes seemingly unnoticed, until enough of it amasses to allow the reflection of engagements lost to appear as what it might actually be- a front, moving steadily forward towards a horizon of hope.

A funny enough thing for me to write, considering the foul disposition held so stalwart earlier. Yet, it is in that seeming contradiction that the point gets proved in full potency.

Now, not all reflections produce the illumination of glory. Nor does each day reward justly in accordance with the merits motioned and emoted. Nor do the arcs of our lives appear to curve towards some ultimate enlightenment. It was not but a few hours ago where my own apparitions of awful ideology wore the guise of absolute- and yet, here I sit now, in the dwindling hours of this Monday, to exclaim the opposite of what felt so inescapable in this very being, just a bit backwards and behind in time. And while every bit of reality is far from the realm of individualistic control, there are portions that are. And foremost in fortitude and fancy, is how we choose to see and what we choose to do, even when the most horrific and degrading experiences find their way into the present being of our person.

And it is a choice.

One that I have often failed, and if my past is prologue- one I will likely fail again. But while so much of the rest of this universe might bludgeon our better perspectives and judgments- there is still even the most miniscule motion that can be made either inward or outward to attempt a correction of course. A deep breath. A moment of authentic comfort. A polite request for help or a perverse exertion of frustration outward into the abyss. A tear, shed in exhaustion or an extreme sense of hopeless forlorn. Any of these, and so many more. The tiny gestures and attempts that taunt the regretful, remorseful, resentful and repugnant emotions into the open where they can be refuted or rescinded, even if for only a moment.

If just enough to crawl into bed to gather the strength for the next day’s march. Or at the dreaded dawn in a dirge of days that never seem to go the way we’d dreamt. A choice gets made, even with the most weighted of sighs. A choice to quest onward. To find the strength in scars. To fight surrender, at least for a moment more. For it just might be that past that moment, is just enough to get you to the next. And if not, another try, says I.

After all, there is always something you can do. If not today, then perhaps, tomorrow.