forced brevity
you’ve been pushing yourself like a fiend lately. johnny and the devil ripping into their fiddles in georgia. you needed time off. messaged the boss you’ll be in to work at noon.
you spent the morning doing nothing - forcing yourself not to check messages or adjust your wall clock, the 12 leaning toward where the 1 should be.
you let yourself be a little crooked too. calmed down.
only to push yourself harder later.
instead of going home after work, you stopped by the bar for one bourbon - one or four. you came home late to a starving mewing cat.
feeding her, and then riding waves of booze and somnolence, you spent the next two hours tapping away at the computer.
you let your thoughts out like you hadn’t in a decade. dormant memories dug up with a shovel, dusted with a fine brush.
before sleeping, you knew you’d overdone it. jolting your old wrist injury with the recoils of your mechanical keyboard.
and now, back in the splint. back at work.
everything stretched over you like a childhood glove you’ve grown out of.