Strange World

This is a strange place.
Everything works the opposite way
from what stories have told me.
I have a hard time believing fairy tales.
Or folk legend.
We do not live happily ever after,
we simply get by.
We simply keep surviving
until we cannot survive anymore.
Such a blessing to be so
Complacent and still apathetic.

The pops of the incendiaries
barely affect me anymore.
Fireworks are such a strange joy.
The opposite, but somehow the same
as jumping feet first or head first
or side first or cartwheeling
into unknown water.

No matter. Insanity is no matter.
This whole charade pales
in comparison to the world
and universe at large.
Nevertheless, I peer out into an ocean
of pretty faces beyond the darkness before me
and still remember yours.
And, that, somehow, makes me smile.
It makes me feel foolish,
but not foolish enough
to stop me from smiling,
even as the bombardments continue
as my neighbors yell at their children
and their pets growl and bay
as the crickets rustle and buzz
in the onslaught of explosions
that seem to rile no one but myself.
Strange world we live in.
Strange world.

Aaron C. Molden