No. 143: Giants

[ssomna]

I have stood on the shoulders of giants
and I have stood with my family, knee-deep in the muck.
That is what happens to dreams untended:
they rot on the branch; they fall and must be waded through,
and no one can tell what they once were.

And I have stood alone
in the winter wind, under the soap-bubble blue dome of the sky,
watching dawn light the clouds.

My college has an excellent six-year graduation rate
but nobody told us.
My class was a diaspora of the brilliant, graduating only a few remnants,
those of us too arrogant and uncreative to flee.
Were we admissions mistakes? Each one flawed,
adding her mosaic piece to the composition,
but leaving long before it could be completed.

I stayed, steadying the plaster in my hands,
watching the guard change, and change again.

I have stood on the shoulders of giants,
I have stood alone in a sea of potential, falling around me like stars,
and I have stood on the shoulders of ordinary people
and wondered if they noticed they were all that stood
between me and the dark muck of the abyss.

Now I stand wondering who else I can bear with me across.