Many-Layered Cake

I barely had a bit of up before getting back to down. Something squeezed the life out of me. And no amount of creativity or sleep or spirits or play-acting could put it back. Celebration melts of a sudden into guilty feelings and rational explanations and attempts at logic that never fully take. I indicted myself for feeling envious. When someone else seems to have what I am missing, I press myself and realize that I don't know what I'm missing. I only know what I think I've lost. I only know what I think might help. And I have no courtroom-quality memory of what anything was like when it was all there. I suspect I just didn't know that I was wanting. Or I don't remember that I was. I was never satisfied or confident or sure. But it's easier to remember the scenes that didn't let on. That's why you keep the smiling pictures and put the less-smiling ones in a box somewhere that doesn't get looked at much. No one wants to remember the day they cried the most they ever cried. Even if pictures were taken.

I sit for long periods of time with the taste of madness in my mouth. I get caught trying to talk myself out of things, and then I realize that I'm talking to myself. Having it out like a crazy person. It happens during long drives. It happens during long silences. It happens at the movies. It keeps me from settling in to anything. It stokes the fires of criticism and frustration that keep me looking in the mirror and finding all that's wrong there. To the brain behind my eyes, it often looks as if everyone else has it better.

I didn't fail this weekend. But I didn't win. And I'm fearful that I might not know the difference.

I know I had it coming
I know I can't be free
But those people keep a-moving
And that's what tortures me