Stalking Myself With a Backpack

The cash-strapped backpack
Sprawled across my shoulders
Holds just enough to keep me going
Forever
The world lies not in the palm
But in the brain
And I'm using mine to craft a reality
Based in the illusory
He, she, we, they, it
Is, isn't, will, wouldn't
Couldn't, shouldn't, shall
Just words strung up on a pole
Waving like a flag
Symbolizing all the things we no longer see
And I keep seeking out
New labels to rebel against
I will not be reduced to a single word or phrase
I am more than my vocabulary
But I can't stop building it
And relying on all those convenient clauses
To capture the souls of all those around me
I roam backstage in search of answers
To what I cannot understand
And come up empty handed
Because all I've really been doing
Is scratching out a niche
In which to place myself
Damn those labels that comfort me
In times of confusion
Agnostic anarcho-socialist hippie
Introverted nerdy Nintendo playing
Book reading vegetarian gay man
With Buddhist leanings
I'll find my people when I find myself
As if that's the easy part
As if I don't lose my tongue in social situations
As if I am somehow comfortable with sexual tension
As if I know enough to know when to lay down my cards
Or when to up the ante
I have parkour dreams on dimly lit stages
Where everyone is just a little bit serious
And snap when I shut my mouth
Because applause tears at my eardrums like a feral cat
Too many compliments and I'm sure
The sidewalk ill be stained in the blood
Of my mind dripping from my head
Because no matter how far you run
You can never outrun yourself
And so I gave up the race
And now I just walk around looking for myself
And I find it everywhere
And I've gotten close enough a time or two
To reach out and grab it
But I'm just so good at avoiding myself
So it all falls back to the wayside
And I tighten the straps on my backpack
Stuff it with something I deem important
And set off again
No longer convinced of the surety of sunrise
I'll travel to see her fall off the edge of the world
And disappear beyond the ocean
I'd swim to the sun and wrap my arms around her
If the moon wasn't so jealous
And would set me free from her gravitational vices
But I'm an earthly bound inhabitant
Of someone else's dream
At least until I relocate those lost plans
Detailing the way back
To the beginning