This Place

every day I leave this place with

an incredible, overwhelming sadness,

my daughter says this place

is sucking the life out of

me;

perhaps she is right;

but perhaps it is something

much deeper;

I feel the fear,

I sense the hopelessness,

I understand the grief,

I know the despair;

it is almost more than

I can bear;

I am part of everyone,

I am part of no one,

I am part of everything,

I am part of nothing;

it has been a long education,

but now the end approaches,

I am done with the false hopes,

I am done with the fantasies,

this world has nothing left

to offer;

You have showed me truths

that no one else could,

You have taken me places

where very few have been,

I no longer have the strength

to fight the manipulators,

the users,

the phonies,

the fakes,

the self-righteous hypocrites;

they have their reward,

they have their world;

this place belongs to them;

I awake with pain,

my body stiff from

laying in bed,

the idea of more pain

makes me lay there for

several minutes,

eventually I move,

and it hurts worse

than I imagined,

then come the leg cramps

and loss of control

of my left leg;

the day is finished,

but still I remain.

.

.