The Elysian Architect of Becoming

In the beginning…

A paper sack ushers in my teenage hands,
its folds whispering: fill me, fill me,
as if groceries were imagined galaxies
and I was the architect of order.

Cans orbit in slow motion,
milk cartons hum like pale moons,
and the conveyor belt stretches into infinity,
like a serpent swallowing stars.

Fluorescent lights spray molten silver,
pooling on the floor like liquefied time,
and I stand ankle-deep in tomorrow,
stacking constellations into neat pyramids,
wanting to believe purpose was like a barcode
that could unlock the universe.

The Climb…

University halls spiral like glass tornadoes,
each rung a theory, a thesis,
a merciless pursuit of letters after my name.

Career doors bloom like carnivorous flowers,
petals lined with teeth,
as choices yawn wide with hunger.

Marriage arrives as a sudden season,
a storm of vows and velvet skies,
followed by children like small suns orbiting my gravity,
their laughter bending the laws of physics.

Purpose becomes a map drawn in crayon and mortgage ink,
every line shouting: go here, now, fast,
while the horizon keeps folding itself
into origami futures,

the scaffolding of my arthritic hands cannot hold.

Old age…

Hums in softer colors.

Walls dissolve into watercolor skies,
and clocks drip their hours
like honey from broken combs.

Smiles evoke tears,

Tears induce more smiles.

Purpose no longer roars,
but becomes a single breath,
a pulse in the wrist,
a truth too simple for ambition to touch.

I see it now:
the summit was never the mountain,
but the stillness at its base,
the way light falls on rain-coated scree,
the way silence holds the shape of laughter’s echo.

Here, authenticity does not smile back,
it opens its hands,
and I step inside,
weightless,
purpose finally whole.