The Snails Have Depression

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I’d tell myself that being a snail isn’t living

And for every breath that’s taken on earth

Is an opportunity to point at the moon and say “I made that for you”

Sometimes you can see it crying in the storms

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I’d tell people “I love you” more and mean it

And for every person who had bad news

I’d print out good news to cancel out the worst of them

Sometimes good erases the bad

I can motivate myself with inspiration but when the pen hits the paper

There’s no creation, I’m like a desert

I’m a snail failing at learning from failures

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I’d look at myself and say,  “Don’t fail, don’t be lazy, don’t slack off.”

For every time that I fail, I cry and for every success it means nothing

Because if you were to compute the number of times I failed

It would be the same number as times I had succeeded

Multiplied by twenty

Because a snail is slow so that same snail gives up on ever achieving its goals

And when it does those goals don’t matter anymore

Because that snail has new ones

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I’d sit down with myself and compare that snails have no fair right or wrong

Or memory

Or perception of time and distance

They just go, slug aimlessly

I’d set a bulls-eye in front of my face, shout aim with the possibility to maim or gain something against myself

Without a player there is no game

There aren’t any extra lives or power boosts or an army behind a sheet ready to defend me

It’s just me, myself, and I

We cheer with and for the underdog because it’s him we see us most in

We can cast a makeshift reflection without a mirror and say, “I told you so”

He’s a window without the reflection perfecting your perception on how you manage yourself

That’s why the snails have depression

We go fast and reach our goals while they score slowly sequentially after us

Suddenly we become the snails

We manipulate, destroy these snails, each other, against one another because when they admire us for our knowledge, we ridicule them for their homage

They see that we have the ability to be the emperors and empresses

But instead we choose to oppress the people below us hence Hitler hence Stalin hence our inner selves

By the time snails reach their home it would have already been demolished

Polished off by a pair of birds or reckless toddlers

Put a snail in a bucket of water and not only does it sink but it chooses not to fight back

Cover it in a packet of salt and it explodes like a time bomb

Snails have lives like may-flies

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I’d tell myself that I’m already in the bucket of water

Caught farther, consumed in it and its agility and ability to run after me

I’d say, “Keep away from being a snail”

My dad says I am my own worst critic

But how come the worst critic always ends up destroying you like the salt?

The snails are in me

I didn’t have to consume them to know that it’s a continuous epidemic

Spiraling, twisting towards and forwards into me

Now that I know what I know, if I knew it then

I wouldn’t have embraced the snails

I’d throw the salt on them

And I’d have filled the bucket to the brim

I’d look at the moon and say, “That’s where I live”

And with every beginning I am re-winning my successes back

Subtracting my failures on the calculator

Not being the denominator to everyone’s problem but being the solution

But mostly,

I am teaching these snails to be faster intuition with the fact they are a part of me