Do you know what it's like to walk on a bridge that is deteriorating?

That is strung between the high plateaus on either side of a canyon floating,

No safety net. 

 

An abyss below, an abyss of failure, 

Despair; I am walking the tightrope suspended over darkness,

It is the downward spiral embodied by a great fissure in the earth.

On the other side dreams are calling,

But each step taken towards them is another risk

Of falling, into old habits.

 

I wake up.

There is a short moment of relief before,

Before I realize I am still in a cage.

Or maybe the cage is inside me.

I struggle to get free,

But the bars are too stubborn, 

I am not strong enough to bend them...

 

I am reminded by a voice from the grave,

'Sing when you hurt and sing when you cry,

Sing when you live and sing when you die'

So I sing, and I sing well.

I know why the caged bird sings,

But I am not the bird.

 

I am a cage. A cage in search

Of a bird, like Kafka.

My heart is an empty shell

And I wish for a reverse metamorphosis,

In which I wake up a human,

Instead of vermin.