Running in circles again
Dancing polka in my mind
Wanting to know if and when
The meaning of life I will find
Running in circles again
Dancing polka in my mind
Wanting to know if and when
The meaning of life I will find
What hour decides a person’s fate?
Which new fork in the road?
When’s going back not possible?
Why go forward at all?
I had not oft questioned my earthly path
Until I found the road came to an end—
Not just an end, a cliff before me then—
No way to turn but back to what I knew
And question then did I all that I knew
The birds, the skies, my God, the very ground
Each thing that once was sure I’ve questioned since
My path was found to end with nar’ a thought
How much until it breaks?
And what else can it take?
What happens when it reaches the last height?
Will it be quietlike?
Or like a thunderstrike?
Will we be here to see the final fight?
As I am writing in my chair
A quiet thought arrives:
Why do I write? How do I dare
To presume to change lives?
Why should I for a moment think
That which I’ve said’s profound?
That all will still my poems drink
When I am in the ground?
This tort’rous thought traps me in webs
Of which I can’t escape
While fleeting inspiration ebbs;
In doubt I myself drape.
How does one find the road he’s meant to take?
When will one know she’s chosen right and well?
Will he yet seen the signs, and his choice make?
Will she receive the answers she can’t tell?
I, too, am drowned by doubt and grayish thought:
What have I done that’s changed this world I see?
Is this what my creator, in me, sought?
Have I done anything but work for me?
I write these things upon a lonely page
Undoubtedly without a hope to be
Someone to change this growing earthly stage
About whom all would say, “Thank God for thee!”
I oft return to ponder thoughts like these
When wond’ring if I’ll yet the moment seize