Selfish Loss

If you look out the window for too long, you mismanage your house as it crumbles around you.

For what I gain, I stand to lose

I’m vexed, always thinking of other people

Determine my own fate based on their reactions

Living with a faint morose desire

To do more, see more

How can I?

How can I decide to live for myself?

The world would destroy me

When I finally recognize what I want and it stands only moments away

I halt again,

I do not grasp it

For I fear the pain I may cause others

I don’t think for myself

I think for the crowd around me

I don’t recognize what I need, I toss those feelings to the side

Instead seizing the wants of people who live within my life

I make decisions based on the will of others

I love and take risks only to the benefit of the public

What do I gain then?

What do I lose?

I lose myself

Someone I always wish so passively to know

I can never step out and recognize myself

I’m darting across a room finding someone else to satisfy

Why can’t I satisfy myself?

What do I want?

The hardest question I’ve ever faced

A petering silence follows and I’m breathless

Disdained and mismanaged in my own chaos

For if I do recognize what I want and chase it,

I lose everyone else

I hurt people, I make people angry with me

So why does gain cost so much?

And why am I not willing to pay?

What am I calculating?

Everyone else is plummeting into their desires, feeling around their caves of wealth

Why must I continue to feed a population, yet starve myself?

Finally I stand here

I recognize something I want

Yet I’m stopped

And once again I weigh the costs

I humble myself

I don’t deserve it

If not me, then who?

What about what I want?

I spend so much time looking out for everyone else

Ensuring everyone else receives what they deserve

Who looks out for me?

Who, other than myself?

Yet I have failed

I have failed to deliver myself

I have failed to move forth with my wants

Instead I deny myself the pleasure too concerned with the effects of my decision

Too scared of how my actions will make others feel

So I please a public, a public that has never fed me in return

A public that has never batted an eye at my disease

A savory disease that perfect strangers find pleasing and tasteful

I’m caring, I’m selfless

What a way to live

But what a way to die

Die with never having truly recognized myself

With never having chased after what I want

What I deserve

So I must lose

I must let you go

If my selfishness angers you, reflect

If my desire and anguish perplexes you, look away

I have the ability to attain

What holds me back but my own desire to satisfy

No more will a crowd receive my praise

No more will a judge tell me I don’t deserve

I place my own crown of thorns on my head

And I take the punches that sting like knives

Call me brutal

Call me unkind

I’ve wasted too much time pondering my impact

Dispelling my needs for the blessings of others.

I want something

I need something, so I can journey on

So I can meet myself

So I can move past this stall that you hold me hostage at

NO, that I hold myself hostage at.

These wounds were made by me

Let’s not forget, I do have the choice

And I’ve been under a spell of fear and cloudy emotion too long

If this turn makes me a demon, pray to god

But I will not sit in silence any longer

Ask me what I need and I shall shout it to the world

I love the world but I’ve forgotten to love myself

I’ve held everyone high for so long that I haven’t seen myself fall from graces

I haven’t lost passion, I’ve gained a new hold

I know what I need and my story will be told.

So face me now with an angry heart

Your words can break ground but this is only the start.

Listen real careful, for its the last time I’ll say

If you’re afraid of the loss, what could you possibly gain?