going bananas

There were four bananas on the tabletop.

And one of them was the one for me.

So how do I choose between four bananas?
Maybe I should take the one closest to the edge of the table.
Maybe I should take the one furthest away from my reach.
Maybe I should take the one with the least number of black spots.
Maybe I should take the one that wasn't really remarkable in any possible way.

Should I just close my eyes and pick one and leave it all to chance?
Should I just do what every one else does and take the one nearest to me?
Should I try to be different and take one of the others?
Or do most people try to be different and take one of the others and I'd really be different if I didn't try to be different and pick the one closest to me after all...?

Is this really as easy as everyone makes out?
My whole life might depend on which banana I pick as an after dinner snack.
Maybe this decision will affect all other decisions I make in my life.
And therefore I am, right now, at a crossroads. Four paths of life. And at the door of each is a single banana, each a miniscule bit different from the rest.

Maybe the banana second from the right has a deadly poisonous worm inside it from the deepest jungles of Africa and if I choose that I'll die instantly and go to heaven.

Maybe the next banana has a blessing laid upon it from God or whoever it is lays those blessings that whosoever eats this banana becomes the happiest rich guy in the world.

Maybe one has a curse saying I'll fail all the next seven exams I give in a row and pass the eighth one with flying colours.

Maybe the last banana is just an ordinary banana that won't change my life in any stupid way.

Maybe one banana would suit me and one wouldn't.
Maybe the one to the right would be too grainy for me.
Maybe the second from the left would be too sweet.
Maybe the first from the left would be just right but I would never know because I'd have eaten the third from the left which wasn't right at all.
Or maybe all of them would suit me equally well.

How can you tell with bananas? They're all wrapped up inside skins where you can't see them.
You can't even sample one and then leave it and try the other. Because once you choose, you've chosen and you're banana sticks with you for better or for worse.

I gave up. And I walked away from the table. Maybe I'd come back later and choose my banana.
Or maybe I'd let other people take away the bananas till there was only one left and that would be the one for me and it wouldn't be my fault if my banana didn't suit me because I had no other choice.

The trouble with careers is, you can't do that.

a wish

Little Martha sat by the window and stared out at the sky.
She didn’t see the pink-white clouds, or the birds flying high.
She didn’t see the colours of the sun, the trees of every kind,
Or even the young moon, faint and slight: Martha, you see, was blind.
But as she waited for another black
Dark empty day to pass,
Growling angry rain clouds came
And hid the brilliant sun – oh so fast!
And little drops, tiny drops of sweet kind rain came down
Touching ever so gently her soft warm cheek and her frilly laced gown
The windowpane was raised up and the curtains drawn back too
And the rain, finding an open door, gleefully flew into
Martha’s spick and span little room
And settled on every space
And gleamed silvery on her mirror and
Light brown on her face.
And then, in a sudden miracle little Martha smiled
Because you see little Martha had suddenly realized
That no one, not even God up there was where she was right now.
And no one, no one in the world knew exactly how
It felt to be her – it felt to feel
Something you could not see
Something that came in its own sweet time
The delightful absolute glee
Of feeling something as a surprise-
Before you knew it was there
And giving you entire attention
To what you felt only – the soft breath of air
Or the soft touch of rain
Again and again and again…
And Martha by the window in the rain and the wind
Martha in her rain-washed room
Martha in her utter delight
Wished that very soon
It would rain again and the rain would catch her by the windowsill
And she wouldn’t forget the way to feel the way she just now did.

thinking of yesterday

Like a frozen ripple of unused humour in the red-gold slashes of darkening twilight and a circling masterpiece of dank cold autumn crocuses shivering in the summer heat for newfound realities of hungry illusions dissected and thundering simplicity in prussian and again and again and again…
I never meant what I said…
I never said what I meant…
It was just lost in a single breath of stifling stillness to the bruised midday infinity.