Separate
Why do I choose to sit apart?
Even among alleged brothers,
when taking the same actions,
working towards the same goals,
still I am not the same.
I have no qualms
dancing, laughing, talking, partying,
going to all the same events, discussing the same topics
and entertaining my friends;
and yet I am not the same.
Among my true friends, those of the past,
and very few of the present,
I do not feel this way.
But among most of those who stand with me day by day,
somehow I manage to stand nigh alone.
I have been told I'm strange,
that I'm an old soul, born in the wrong era;
that I'm 'out there'.
I haven't been ostracized, so to speak,
not by anyone who mattered;
but I have, often enough, been cast as different.
Even now, as I sit in this chair,
with five fellows near, I am not as one.
They are not far at all,
and yet somehow at a great distance.
An outsider among peers.
In many ways it bothers me not,
this halfway exile of mine;
I am given the freedom to be who I wish, am -
fairly free of the pressures so many grapple with.
But there is a thing of interest,
something to notice about the life that I lead -
more often than not I find myself
studying, surveying, viewing through planes of glass -
counted separate,
feeling separate,
thinking separate -
gathering data on the behavior
of all the other monkeys,
in all the other cages.
Why?
Copyright © Andy Sprouse | Year Posted 2014
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