Remember to Enjoy Yourself

You can hear the birds chirping outside in the city streets beyond your window but you wonder how they could possibly sing in the rain in the middle of March while there are remnants of last week’s snow still on the sidewalks. Then you wonder how you get yourself out of your twin bed every morning to make a cup of coffee with probably too much cream. Except you’re not singing. You try to paint the page with words like a canvas but you understand that metaphor only gets you so far through a sentence.
Reminders on your calendar to not kill yourself today and the sound of the record fading as you walk to the kitchen to microwave yourself a frozen meal. This is you singing. The beeping of the microwave letting you know the food is done. The turning over of cars finally starting in the street and those same cars driving fast down the hill not seeming care about the other cars, your car, parked on the side of the street.
The tree outside your window still has leaves from last fall that have not fallen off yet. These leaves hanging on for their lives knowing a fate of being crushed by human feet and disintegrating into the earth will greet them if they release their grip.
This is your song. The birds are singing you a song.