I’m thirty floors up and my shoes are set aside,
My feet planted on the ledge to catch an early flight.
I shut my eyes, I breathe and think,
A caricature of memories flashes before me in a blink.
I think of my mother and the child she’ll have lost,
The burden she’s laden, how much a funeral costs.
I think of my siblings and the weight they’d carry,
Cursed to remember the sister they’d bury.
I think of my friends and the days we spent bid adieu,
Crestfallen as they look down, so I look down too.
But most of all, I think of me,
The little girl I once was and the old woman I’ll never be.
I think of my past, when push came to shove,
How small they seemed now, from thirty floors above.
“It gets better,” they said, “there’s more to see!”
In all the years, I sought reprieve,
But would it really be thirty floors under me?
I’m fearful now, the walls cave in,
Would the relief really be worth my self-inflicted sin?
I am but one speck, so how was I to know
All that I could be, if I were to go?
To think, I thought there’d be no fix,
Yet, I look down and see the things I’d miss.
What will happen if I stay?
Would it be so bad to live to see another day?
I try to think of down below—
Please, I don’t want to go.
There’s more to me, I know there is!
It can’t be here that I’ll find bliss.
I stagger back, the concrete a delight,
To think I’d almost fallen thirty floors to my plight.
