Quicksand

Musing on mortality

Not so long ago, whenever time ran down, I’d flip the glass and take it from the top.

Insidiously, time has turned itself inside out to master me.

The sand has quickened. The gently drifting grains have consolidated and turned malignant.

Quicksand. There is no escaping its inexorable pull toward oblivion.

Imprisoned in the glass, I am drawn toward the point from which there is no return. When the end of the day comes, there will be no way to start it over again.

Once upon a time, I thought I could build castles to the sky. The tides, in mockery of my audacity, have turned on me, drenching my erstwhile fantasies. I salvage what I can, but no matter how tightly I clench my fist, the sand slips through my fingers.

The day will come when the last of what I hold dear will be gone. The grain-by-grain erosion is imperceptible. There is no sudden arrival at the dreaded state of barrenness.

But there are signs en route: Desert Ahead.

I search out diversions from the mainline to Emptiness. I seek the peopled oases that fleetingly supply my superficial wellspring of praise. I grasp the good words as they gush. The refreshment they provide is all too brief; they are of no substance.

In my youth, I craved merely approval; I’ve become greedy for admiration. But thirst cannot be assuaged by cupping hands under a geyser that is a mirage. Hunger cannot be sated by complimentary cotton candy.

I’ve been graced by accoutrements accrued through fickle favors of fate; I’ve garnered credit for random guesses on the multiple choices in life.

The beautiful ones are oft crushed by the passage of time; it would be far worse for me had I basked in beauty, as I bathed in the fountain of youth.

I console myself with that thought, as I slowly smother in the quicksand.