Panorama Options

[*CrackedRearView*]

Scholars say that the pressure of the atmosphere is most potent,
I tend to disagree.
Sure, the ample lack of oxygen and oppressive air pressure would crush bones, and bray the very fibers that allow you to physically subside.
But what's worse?
Today I sat, legs dangling twenty feet above what used to be Raintree Lake.
I say it this way simply because that's how it is; it's dead to me.
When you rise at 5:00 A.M. and make it to the dock by 5:30, you're cheating nature.
You've begun a footrace with an entity millions of miles away that, in truth, is moving faster than a human mind could comprehend.
And the irony? You win.
Sometimes you even beat it by a fair fifteen minutes, giving you time to position yourself on your normal rock.
Giving you time to let your legs dangle over what, for four years, was your deliverance; your extrication.
And then it comes.
Yawning, your enigmatic racing opponent comes creeping over the wall like a curious child peering into his neighbor's yard.
First, the fingers, then a head, and finally, with enough time to build enough courage, it comes silently clamoring into sight, breaking free of the horizon.
And it sits there, suspended for a moment, fluttering wild with anger at your triumph.
But there's a byproduct: the view.
The water, a vast pool of replenishment, blanketed for eight hours in lonely, forlorn darkness, is plastered with the incandescence it screams for overnight.
You've heard it.
The sight is amazing. Watching the water, trees, birds, and the plain experience a daily catharsis that goes so unnoticed is exquisite.
Today was a day for listening to things destitute. To lend an ear to the things I've loved for years, but never took the time to hear.
Whether it was at the cemetery, feeling the lulling tickle of the fog as hundreds of unappreciated voices of years past soothed my nerve, whether it was lying on my stomach in the backyard taking a final gaze at Kansas City's illuminated silhouette, or whether it was walking away from Kansas City's glorious delineation to spend an hour at Panera with two little boys I won't see for a very long time, the muffled shrill of the unheeded is the most beautiful thing I've ever heard.
The pressure of an emotional panorama far surpasses anything the atmosphere could inflict.
The scholars just haven't heard the screams.

[*Azarel*]

Picturesque - beautiful language and imagery. I especially like how your last line refers back to the first.

[ItzOnlySydney]

oo i love the last line lol. great poem a tad long but still great =).

[*CrackedRearView*]

Oh imagery.

Sweet imagery...

[*Kathleen*]

Ooh wow. I should've known that you were an awesome writer as well.