Too Many... by Shiloh

It looks like another year is almost done,-
I'm still around, and it's been a long ride.
Never thought I'd make it this far,
when you figure the odds of guys like me;
my group has all the numbers - all the wrong ones -
too many unexplained cancers,
too many unexpected heart attacks,
too many unexplained single car accidents,
too many suicides...
too many nights in a bar,
too many overdoses of hard drugs, pills, or both...
yeah, maybe too many memories, as well.
Maybe too big a serving of the lonely side of life;
too many regrets, too many shattered dreams,
too many turns without a roadmap,
too many decisions that turned out wrong,
too many worries, too many moments of feelings of guilt,
too many moments of anger, hate, pain -
yeah... mostly too many moments of pain...
Then there are the times, too many of them,
when the early morning hours bring back
things better left unremembered,
and no one around to talk with,
no one to talk you back from the brink...
too many names, too many moments
crammed full of a lifetime of hell.

It wasn't always this way, you know.
But too many things have happened,
too many nights of waking up screaming,
because there were too many times
when you just weren't enough, by yourself, to handle the situation,
when you were the one who was supposed to have the answers,-
and those moments visit you again, too many times.
Too many nights of trying not to sleep,
because you know what's waiting there for you.
Too many questions, too many tears,
too many guilty breaths when others no longer breathe...

It becomes a part of you, you never get away from it -
too many moments behind you, no way to escape them,
no way to get away from them, no way to leave them behind;
you've been through this too many times, and it won't end,
and another year will go by...
Sometimes, in your mind, you think of all those years
and you feel there have been too many of them,-
and you wonder if there will come a time
when you decide you have had that thought
too many times...

Bipedalguy (75.67.182.104) -- Friday, January 11 2008, 04:25 am

Very sad, but well expressed.
Wondering if, in the distant past, their might have been a another choice to make, which might have been better for those with whom you went into hell, and wondering if more could have made it back.
In retrospect, one can usually think of lots of choices that would have worked out better, but what choices do you have when there's no time to think?
The rearview mirror gives a clear image, but it can eat away at you like the eternal worm.
Don't be too hard on yourself.
Peace, Bipe

shiloh (66.24.112.118) -- Friday, January 11 2008, 05:38 am

mood swings suck -
and being bipolar with a few other things tossed into the mix to make it interesting doesn't help much... hindsight, as you know, is always 20/20, but the eternal "what if's" do, as you say, haunt you, seemingly forever. peace, my friend...

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