Anchored

Anchored

The question is not whether you are anchored…

The question is where you are anchored?

Are you anchored to a memory
In the hope that it can be revived?

Are you anchored to a possibility
That requires you to wait in the past?

Are you anchored in a yesterday
That is destined never to be relived?

Locate where you are anchored honestly!

Don’t be fooled because you’re afloat
That does not mean you’re moving forwards
Harboured boats have the sense of movement
Yet they can always be found in the same spot

                                          Every single day

Reach into your soul and speak in tongues
Converse with your heart in the language of truths
Make peace with your past and bid it farewell
Accept it can be your home no longer

Bathe and dress in your travelling clothes
Gather those things you need for the journey
Leave all other things where they belong
In the library of your past

Look back at your delusion with kind eyes
Forgive yourself for wishing for what was
Be grateful you experienced what you miss
With self-respect, turn and search the horizon

The future will never lay behind you
The promise of tomorrow is not in any mirror
The lessons you take from yesterday will feed you
The choices you make today sculpt what will be

‘If Only’ must be converted to ‘What If’
Change the grammatical tense of your life
The delusion illusion must be shattered
Denial no longer accepted on board

No longer can you stand hand on tiller
Looking longingly out to sea
Whilst you only travel in your mind
Remain tethered to the dock

You’re a vessel built for journeys
Exotic experiences lay just out of sight
When did you last display sufficient courage,
to lose sight of the shoreline?

You are where you’ve been
Repetitive cycles of ‘nothing changes’
Treading water is existing, not living!

                               You have become your own lie

Do you have the courage to sail?

Do you dare to leave harbour?

                               Do you have what it takes?

Do You?

If you don’t, then this is the point in the poem where you reinforce the self lies that you hold so dear…

This is where you nod intellectually at the metaphors and parallels in your own life, as if somehow, thinking has ever equalled action.

This is where you find your own justifications for why you must stay in port, and nod in agreement to your own subterfuge…

Or

You could take a deep breath, wave fondly to the comfort zone you have been basking in, untether yourself from the harbour wall and…

Weigh Anchor

© Iain Merchant 2020