On Existence and Its Treachery

By Rhianna Mason

Rhianna Mason is a first-year Environmental Sciences major. She plays on the women's soccer team and is very passionate about environmental conservation. Most of her work is free-form poetry with a focus on nature and mental health. 

I burn bridges because I can swim. 

Do not think– 

not for a second–

that I need you. 

I am a shark, 

in need of constant motion, 

for fear of the deterioration 

of rotting immobilization. 

Swim, 

swim,

swim. 

Find a new marina, 

a new path to wander,

a new load to carry,

a new life to lead.

Avoid everyone, all the time.

Find a new home miles away.

Swim until your muscles atrophy. 

Hide until your mind dwindles.

Seek out the light and shrink from it.

Swim, 

swim, 

swim. 

I know what I am doing

I understand why I do it

The self-isolation.

The aloofness.

The anger.

The detachment.

The dissociation. 

Oh, how the irritability rears its ugly head, 

how the snarling teeth and whiplike tail 

show themselves to me once again.

How the anger warms up my chest, 

grips hard, never promising release.

How inhuman I become.

How animalistic I become.

How barbaric I become. 

I know where this path of ruin leads.

It is a cul-de-sac.

I circle this drive over

and over again. The birds never 

question me as I repeat the same 

vicious cycle of avoidance. I drive

in comatose circles once again,

wondering why the results never differ,

wondering why the senseless ache remains.

Self-combustion is ceaseless.

I am an ouroboros– 

the snake that eats its own tail,

never quite getting its fill,

wondering why the results never differ,

why the isolation remains. 

Life requires an energy I do not have. 

I am a waste of a human soul.

I should have been born a bird

or a tree

or not at all.