Dry Land

I'm surrounded by people who don't know what they want. Who they are. Why they love who they love. I'm surrounded by the aftermath of affection's harsher nature. By hurt feelings. By red eyes. By people looking the other way. And what's the other way, my almost friend? Do things reverse themselves over there? Have they just not happened on that side of the fence yet? Is that where you're looking? Where intentions are different? Motivations less selfish? Doubtful, doubtful. I've found that you can't find a happier ending by looking in a different direction. It's all dirty; nothing's clean. I'm surrounded by dirt. By tainted trust. By forgotten progress. By pride so strong it destroys practicality. And surrounded like this; I find it hard to breathe. To see whose touching me. To know if I'm even being touched. But then I grab your hand. Like a child in a department store reaching for his mother; I grab for you. Somehow I know how your hand feels even when I can't see it. And through the throngs of people I hear you say "sky" and I know that it was in fact the people under the sky that got darker; that the night really wasn't coming on that fast. You say "uproar" and I know you mean to say that I'm not overreacting to the situation at hand, to what's wrong with this crowd. And while others are quiet, you shout. And others want to prove something, you only want to be certain that what you find already proven will not cease to be true. You tug at my hand. We make waves in the mass and I don't mind. I want to proclaim--"Look who's standing next to me. Look who knows what I know. Look who feels what I've been feeling"--just as enclosed, just as vulnerable, just as unsure. It feels like I'm going to be absorbed by everyone around me. By their false ideas. By the things they don't say. By innocent mistakes made by the guilt-ridden. Just innocent mistakes. I wish I could lift you and I out of this but I can't fly; I can only swim. So we'll work through the water. We'll hold our breath. And when the storm has ended, and the sea of people is gone taking the dark sky with it; we'll finally be on dry land. By stability. By hard ground. And you'll still be holding onto me like that mother in Macy's, or Nordstrom's or somewhere--happy to know that I'd never let go and disappear in the crowd.