3:17 A.M. and Nowhere to Go

It's 3:17 again.

The fan keeps turning
like it has somewhere to be.

I have checked my phone eleven times.
There is nothing new.
I check again.

Somewhere, people are sleeping
beside the people they love.

Somewhere, someone is being missed
without knowing it.

And somewhere,
I am supposed to be doing something
with this life.

I don't know what.

I have ambitions that keep me awake
and a heart that doesn't know
what to do with the morning.

I want to leave this room.
I want to stay here forever.

I want someone to ask what's wrong.
I don't want to explain.

I want to be remembered.
I want to disappear
without becoming a tragedy
in somebody else's story.

There are so many versions of me
I haven't managed to become.

And tonight,
they all seem to be sleeping peacefully
while I lie awake
accounting for the distance.

At 3:17,
the world feels strangely honest.

Nobody is asking me to succeed.
Nobody is watching me pretend.
Even my reflection looks too tired
to offer another version of the truth.

I turn the phone face down.

Close my eyes.

And just before sleep arrives,
one thought crosses my mind:

I wonder how many nights
a person can spend waiting for life
before they realise
life has been waiting for them, too.