Sleep, son.
You cannot wrestle the night,
nor wring miracles from the dark.
Even stars must dim to be born anew.
Lay down your stubborn bones,
and let the soft pull of dreams
unburden the weight of another unyielding day.
Today, you shuffled papers,
asked the cold bureaucracy for grace,
and sat among the Wednesday faithful,
speaking of certainties—numbers, standards,
the certifiable world,
where ambition is measured, stamped,
and filed.
I am 33.
The dream of a PhD slipped from last year’s grasp,
and this year mocks me with delays.
Perhaps I will greet it at 34,
the shore of youth behind me,
its tides pulling back as manhood
stretches its stern hands before me.
A professorship awaits, they say.
Fingers crossed, prayers sent skyward,
where only He knows how much
I hunger for it—
how my whole self has unraveled into this pursuit,
this gilded rope of longing tied to the academy.
My destiny whispers like a far-off sea.
I want to live bright,
to leave ripples in the water,
to speak after months of silence—
words heavy with purpose.
But oh, what of my homeland,
the castle I built from sand and dreams?
What of the emptiness that stalks me,
this hollow hunger I feed with sacrifice?
I am broke,
but I spent on something noble,
and the sand in my hands still feels like a castle.
My tomorrow is assured,
even as the present gnaws at my resolve.
I seek redemption—no blade, no blood.
Only the quiet grace of my generation’s way.
Will you walk with me?
To H? To hope?
No?
Then I walk alone, as I always have.
But no longer do I bury my face in the dirt,
shoulders drooping beneath doubt.
Now I stride, head high,
through fields riddled with potholes.
I climb, I stumble, I climb again.
One day,
the honor will be mine—
to raise Castle de Vince from the rubble,
to see Tuala Blossoms bloom in sunlit gardens,
to touch the wheel of the car I dreamed of,
to lift my chin to the world.
A distant dream?
Perhaps not.
C is the link, the pin holding
the fragile map together.
I will persuade.
I will reason.
I will win.
And through it all, I will walk,
unbowed, unbroken,
toward a horizon
that will not turn me away.
