Tired

"How are you," she asked.

And the only thing I could think to say, the only thing that came to mind

... was that I am tired.


I am so tired.

I am tired of people asking me how I am
and never really wanting to know the answer,
the truth that hides behind every "fine" or "OK".

The simple truth that I am, really, tired.

Really, really tired.

I am tired of smiling through a day that is just another collection of pain.

I am tired of keeping to the bright side of the street.

I am tired of being strong, of being brave, of pretending again
that I am not just weeping while standing here pretending life is sweet.

I am tired.  So very, voluminously, vociferously, volcanically tired.

And the worst thing about being so tired is that I cannot sleep.
For if I close my eyes, if I try to get some rest,
if I slip into slumber and start to dream, a dream so deep,
I may miss a chance, The Chance that might be my best -

... to get what I need so that I can stop being tired.

And mostly I'm tired, so tired of ... of being me.

I am so tired I do not even know who I would be if I should stop being tired.

Everything about me is so warped, so wrecked, so wrong from being so tired for so long.

Would I even know me should I stop being tired?



"How are you," she said.

And I said I was fine.
I lied, because lying to people that don't want to hear the truth is easier.

It saves the explanations.

It stoppers the uncomfortable silences,
the pretending, the pitying, the posturing that people perform
when they really don't want to know.

I am so tired that I'll say what they expect to hear
instead of what I really should say, the real way
that I am.  How I really am. These conventions that we hold dear,
all the inane, insane, insincere, infantile intimations we say...

… really don’t mean a thing.  Nothing.

They are empty words -
OK.
Fine.

And I am still tired.

I’d curl up and lay my head down
and try to shut my eyes.
But I am so tired
I can't even find the ground when I fall down.