impact - n e r v o u s

my heart beats slowly, like the sound of
a body thumping against the ground in slow motion,
and I take a sharp breath, wondering
if anyone saw me out here taking the papers.

I shouldn't care, but I do, they're all around me-
and I'm trapped by what they'll say and what they'll think
and what they'll do when they find out.
when it really doesn't matter, or make any sense at all.

and I get home, with everyone cheering me on,
but they can't see, they never will, when it all goes wrong.
when I'm like this I'm dangerous, like a man
with a vendetta against the people who took his dreams away.

but it's not the same.

people may be looking my way but they're not
looking at me, all caught up in their own little
make believe worlds, not caring about another's
ability to walk or talk like they can.

but I see them and I stupidly assume, thinking
that someone would actually care.

care enough to look my way and judge.

time slows like the moment before you take your
very last breath, and you stop. 

who cares if people watch when you fall,
and you crash and you burn,
but you can't be helped- no, not at all.

who cares if they think that you can't run
as fast as Hermes with a message for Zeus,
you're just as important, you need to be heard.

I silently walk down these halls, head down low,
only needing someone to ask what I hold in my shaking hands
before I can break down and let it all spew out like
a quiet storm-- something I can't withstand.

and then I hear the words that scare me the most,
and I'm terrified, so terrified that my skin goes pale
and my hands start to sweat, friends turning to me to
tell me I look sick, like a ghost.

but I'm not gone, I'm still here and I'm shaking in my
too-large shoes to fill. how the hell can I get there,
how the hell can I make it? my mind asks,
and I get a rush and a cold shiver as I shoot myself
down, getting a small slight chill.

it should be so easy, not hard like it seems to me now.
it's even harder waking up with a smile on your face,
ready to face the world yet another day where you're
tempted, so tempted, to run away.

but that's what this is-- I tell myself.

track is just another word for letting it all run out in
a silent stream of thumps on pavement, running
away from the problems of day to day life, and
towards a place you don't know yet, but maybe
there won't be any strife to be had with the ones around
you there.

and maybe, just maybe-- someone will care.