what am i doing with my life
but spending time—
the capital that is fixed and fleeting,
depleting second by minute by hour as the sand in the glass that represents itself inversely somehow—
at a rate of forty-two hours, spent
seated and hunched over a purposefully dim screen
on which windows are arranged just so
to appear as though work is being done
under the harsh pulsing flicker of fluorescent tubes
recessed into the ceiling
from which rain drips,
when it rains outside it rains inside
and so buckets are placed strategically to catch the falling sky
what am i doing with my life,
but acquiring more money—
the idea of things worth a certain number
and represented as those numbers on another dimly lit screen
to be exchanged for things actual and imagined
the money, a stand-in for my inaction
saying that I don't have enough
and so I can't go yet, I can't get in my car
and drive until something looks interesting
until the highway empties of cars and upcoming exits
and all that is
is the horizon, ever closer but further
the sky growing darker
and closer the further up and out you go
until the stars are within reach if only your arms were long enough
and the lights up there were like the ones shining brightly in a rear-view mirror,
obscuring the view
and closer than they appear