This Imperfect Life

Right-side Down?

Maybe

To find contentment

To arrive at a place of peace

I simply need

To lower my standards

And stop striving for perfection?

To toss aside

My perpetual quest

For flawlessness

My dis-satisfaction

With anything less;

To somehow dull my appetite

For things to always be perfect

What if I tried

Expecting them not to be?

What if I envisaged

Life to be messy,

To feel lonely, empty

Overwhelming, hard?

Surely then

I'll really notice

And appreciate those moments

When it’s not;

Perhaps

I need to dissolve

this mindset,

This romanticized idealistic paradigm

That tells me life is meant to be

Seamlessly complete

Always pleasant and right-side up?

That way,

when things turn upside-down,

When I get squiggly lines

Instead of straight ones,

When the road is bumpy

Instead of smooth

And when I’m trekking uphill

Instead of gliding easily down

It might not seem

Half as bad.