The Man
Who Turned Himself into a Chair
“A chair
is still a chair even when
there’s no
one sitting there.”
~Hal David
It must be a tyranny
to be so rigid.
I
want no part in this travesty.
You,
who were so bored with life
fled
into paralysis rather than analysis.
I
think of you as asleep, as it
helps
me reach you with compassion.
Had
you known doing and saying
the
same things over and over
would
result in this staid metamorphosis,
would
you have persisted
with such analgesic repetition?
I
have questions.
Was
it not enough to be able
to
leave a room at will?
When
your need to feel safe
imprisoned
you in unsayable stasis;
artistic
equal to the plastic flower
sans
scent or power to arouse,
a
bulb that offers no light, then,
where
art thou source of electricity?
Is
this any way to escape responsibility
surrendering
your privilege to respond.
Can
anyone really be happy
with a soul swaddled as a mummy
in
fetid fabric for the rest of time?
You
who once loved classical music,
what
can you hear through your gauze?
Where
do you hide your likes and dislikes
now
that opinions are impossible to express?
Was
life so intimidating that the blood
in
your veins froze into down feathers,
wings
that once enabled flight
now
only filling without agency.
Do
you not miss the give and take
of
ordinary conversation?
Had
you become so dispassionate
that
turning into a chair took the form of a relief.
Maybe
it is of some benefit not to care
who
sits upon you. Still,
how
does one run out of things worth saying?
What
aesthetic so enticing that you
became content to be part of the decor?
Did
you think becoming a chair
might
cause others to value you more?
A
chair is no way to make yourself useful.
If
we’re not encouraged to be ourselves
what
good is it to retreat into the mise en scene?
Who
aspires to be a piece of furniture, anyway?
What
uniformity in being human
isn’t
self-imposed?
To
be alive, awake, is to be
justifiably
unpredictable.
The
truth is, I did not see it
happening
slowly over time,
as
wood fossilizes
unnoticed
into stone.
Your
skin changed its texture
from
smooth to parched burlap.
Your
back became hunched.
You
sprouted wooden arms.
Your
bottom sagged.
by
putting yourself out to pasture,
a
thing entirely unto itself,
a
chair in a field of flowers,
you've
become both
a black
sheep and lost lamb.
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