So, Help Me, God

Lord, open my heart, said Moses, and give me the courage to surmount this hardship. Untangle my twisted tongue, that I may speak, and be understood.

—The Koran, 20:26-28

I’m still standing outside the Yukon Club, wearing that ridiculous hat, teetering in the bright sunlight. I can barely stand up. I have to think hard about it, how necessary it is that I remain standing.

I am wobbling, my body, the world beneath my feet.

Somewhere in me, in a sad and besieged little pocket of truth, I wish that I wasn’t like this, that I had not let another morning bring me to this corner in the sun, with everything so unfocused. Through that little pinhole of light in my mind I see myself, grim, aware that I am muttering, that I will never get home, not today, not this morning. I am so sorry.

Someone gives me a wide berth, veers well around me on the sidewalk, gawking. I have to hold my arms up and out, for balance. I move, carefully, almost in slow motion, lost as shit. An occasional fucker hoots from the blurred confusion of the street, laughter flung from car windows.

I am not going to get home, not today.

It has come, finally, to this. I am not so gifted. I am going to fall. There is nothing I can do now to stop it.

I am not fucking around.

I am going down.