mmmmcdlxxvii

Laughing Away the End of Times

Laughing away the end of times
might just work a while. Does
history stand with comedy?

Meanwhile, I take my pills.
Every morning. I check my
blood. Sugar and pressure.

I carry around additional pills;
eye drops, which I carry around
with me, as well; I scratch my

head, wondering what will be
come of me—also, it’s a nervous
habit. I call myself old as I get

older, not really knowing when
it’s right to say “I’m old,” yet
knowing each of these thoughts

could be my last. I tend not 

to focus too much on that, 
keeping it at the periphery 

of my mind, nonetheless. I’m
healthy, but don’t feel the health
iest. I wonder who looks at me

thinking he’s looking pretty grim,
lately, or of those that’ve never
seen me before, I just wonder

sometimes what they must think,
if anything. Relatively. Not out of
vanity so much, but out of a

desire to see who I might seem
to be by way of other eyes. I have
some ideas regarding who I am,

how healthy or unhealthy I might
be, but what do I know? I take
some comfort—that’s not exactly

the right word—out of the fact
that I’ve lived most of my life in
an intentional state of awareness,

of (semi-)focus, even, on ephemera
lity. I certainly don’t want to go,
not at all. Ah, mortality. At least

I sort of sail through the subject
as quickly as possible, so as not
to be overly burdened by it, while

keeping it in there.  Of more signific

ance is the time I spend on the subject 

of morality. And then I see a mouse

scuttle the short distance from
one wall of my living room,
my only room to the other.

It is in this way that my
mind moves from one
subject to the next.