You’ll Drown

As I was going through some old papers, I found this single sheet, apparently something I wrote when I was a high school senior, although I have absolutely no memory of it. My best guess is that it was written shortly after our senior class trip to Washington, D.C., as it references the Lincoln Memorial. It appears to have been written quickly, with a couple crossed out words and the word “mire” misspelled.

I don’t know how to categorize it as it’s neither an essay nor a story, but I showed it to someone who called it poetic and further said it’s something that I could have written today. Which is true.

It surprised me to find out that I could be so downbeat back in those days.

You’ll Drown

My but things look rosy on the mall this morning. Lincoln Memorial never looked finer. A great supreme end honoring a great President. But before that supreme end, that’s the killer. There they are, our people all standing and looking at their reflections in the water. Perhaps that little pool would be better termed the swamp.

Oh, there are ugly ogres in there, just waiting to devour a courageous human. It’s sort of like the Christians and the lions in the arena. There’s not a chance in the world for survival, unless, of course, you can bribe a lion. Felix Feldspar, now he was a courageous one. He tried to reach that supreme end through the swamp. He shouted that he would break a path through that muddy mier [sic]. He felt like Moses leading the Israelites to Canaan. Felix came to a rather abrupt end. However, reliable sources say that his ghost sits on the bank and wiggles his toes in the water just for spite.

The people on the bank are not to be neglected. They consist of the trampling and trampled. Whether they be the lowly or the lower, they all peer at their distorted reflections and feel extremely successful and safe upon that bank. But somehow they are going under too. I think they realize it, but still they clamor and rush for their supreme end.

Please people, don’t let your masks drop and above all remember, you’ll drown.