Maybe it’s the wind,
alternately sighing and whipping around the house,
slamming doors and scattering the dry, fallen leaves,
tossing up the sheet music and sending it spiraling to the floor in disarray
Maybe it’s the thunder,
rumbling darkly and ominously in the distance
threatening a storm yet withholding the rain.
Maybe it’s the clouds
casting their gray pall over the city,
making night seem near and the day long done.
Maybe it’s the music,
no matter how cheery, echoing false in my ears,
like a platitude from an insincere friend.
Maybe it’s the exhaustion
weighing down my bones, seemingly undeserved,
something more, something deeper than mere tiredness of muscle.
Maybe it’s my heart,
heavy in my chest, sinking always in spite of all the smiles and laughter
weary of all that it carries, tired from the wringing and the dread.
Maybe it’s the thoughts,
all the “never agains” and the “last times” and the “maybes,”
all the leaving, the goodbyes, the changes,
all that will be left unsaid, unfinished, undone.
Maybe.
I don’t know.
But I’m not okay.
