some days are filled with need, others with regret, the peaks and valleys of emotion shift and rage like tectonic adolescence

long ago he stopped trying to regulate them, to dam the stream, to damn the chemicals, to wrangle and brand the dissonance

now he floats on a paper mache raft through churning rapids and shallows, invigorated by the spray, soaked to the bone with chattering teeth and blue fingertips

as the waters grow agitated, tumultuously slapping against the rocks, he can hear the sounds of the waterfall ahead around the bend

he lays back, lies to beauty of nature that he will be fine, geysers erupt and he spins and floats and falls as the bottom of his vessel becomes soggy and thin

another empty plea for salvation, ignored as the sodden boat sinks and he opens his mouth and begins to sing

down down into the river

to drown drown beneath the waves

for every bucket bucket bucket of water

three more enter the fray

and it’s down down into the water

where he’ll drown drown one of these days

as he sinks sinks into the sorrow

he smiles smiles at each of the waves

he loved loved loved another

but she kept kept looking away

so he sank sank into the water

and he floated floated floated away

lost lost without a compass

as he sailed sailed sailed away

not a last last last look behind him

his love faded faded faded away