on the other side

i am an inadequate mess. look at me now: different than what i used to be. how wonderful it sounds, but shifting your shape is unsettling. you were happier then than you are now, all changed and clear. but in my new shoes and my new clothes i feel colorless, like a baby bleached or a horse skinned. although i try, i remember less of who i used to be. had my skin always felt this way? my face? my hands so rough with memory? this mass, has it ever been new? questions i am barely able to answer. maybe forgetfulness isn't such a gift after all. but if i could remember would i be able to turn around? no, i'm sure not. i'm sure i'd be stuck knowing what i lost or gained, a fact that would hold me up and prod at my naked feet until i cried for forgiveness. is gaining more always better? does that mean you're ahead? perhaps it means you've actually fallen behind. all the games i still play, it seems that's the only steady calm in this human thunderstorm i've created. crafted and carved to my new requirements, but the same trickery as it's always been. pretty love songs don't put me to sleep anymore, but neither does anger or repent. and tommorrow and for the rest of my life i'll never wake up to walk those old halls, i'll wake up to walk a new one. whether it is one towards you, or to a bedroom, a home, an office, a ward, or a family, it will never be the same as it once was. my acceptance does not equal my tolerance. the same demand will take over soon, the same demand that creeps up my spine and into all my nerves; it yells across my back: "wait."