Write the Other Way

Inifinity

You, there

Listen to me;

You might not be able to see me

Yet

But if you listen closely

You might be able

To hear

Do you remember me?

We met many years ago

But it has been so long

And last time I saw you

You were so young;

You have aged, now,

You are not the child I was knew,

And I can only vaguely see

The child in you

When we last met,

You were wiser, too;

You questioned the world—

You questioned me!—

But now,

You question nothing—

Nothing

But how you’ve grown!

Not at all what I expected

Although

My expectations were very high

Back then;

I suppose it would have been impossible

To meet them—

But, wait, how old are you?

Not even twenty, you say,

And this is where you are?

I said that I had high expectations,

But even in my nightmares

I would have seen as you as more than—

Ah, never mind;

It was ultimately your choice I suppose;

You are, older than me, after all—

Age knows best!

Can you still hear me?

Are you still listening?

I feel as if

You’ve forgotten who I am—

Do you not know who I am?

Can you not see me, still?

You, listen to me,

I know it’s been a long time

But you swore to me—

You promised—

That you would never forget;

And now I am nothing

Absolutely nothing

To you,

So grown and mighty,

You, you;

Can you not see?

I am you;

I am the childhood

That you promised

That you would never forget

And now

You, all filled up with your big ideas,

You’ve forgotten who I am

So go ahead, shoot for the stars,

If that’s what you want;

Travel the world and start a family—

Do whatever you please!—

Just remember what you promised me:

We were planning on a little more than that;

We were headed to infinity

But now

You’ve left me—

You’ve left yourself—

Here

In Between the Lines

Don’t try to read in between the lines

I assure you that there’s nothing there;

I promise, it’s nothing but empty space.

Really—there’s nothing.

When I write on real paper—

The stuff that you can hold in your hand, made from trees—

I like to write in between the lines

But that’s only because it’s convenient to do so

And when I do that

Then it is okay for you to read in between them

But here it’s not

Not only because there is nothynnnbing there

And I assure you, nothing is,

But because there aren’t any lines on this paper

Except I guess if you turned the paper

Sideways it would look

Almost like an awkward bar graph

And maybe then you could say that those bars were lines

But really, though, there are no lines on this paper

And since that’s the case

 I encourage you not to read in between them

And no matter how many times I say it

I bet that people are going to do it—

Who listens to someone my age anyways—

And there are even going to be

Those people

Who insist that they’ve found something.

And to those people, I have this to say:

Get a magnifying glass, if you must

Because there really is nothing

In between the lines.

And once you’re proven wrong,

Stop trying, because the more you try to

Read in between the lines

The more people feel compelled to

Write in between them

And I’m sick and tired

Of trying to read the useless scribbling of men

In between the—

WAIT, WAIT—

Oh, excuse me, for a second there

I thought I saw something

In between the lines—

I was scared!—

But do not worry!

It was merely the light playing tricks with my eyes—

How it has a way of bending perception—

To the point that I almost would have sworn I saw something.

Alas, there is nothing,

Not a thing,

In between the lines.