At the Crossroads of Being: The Calendar of Echoes

We drift through days like smoke through air,
our footsteps echoing in halls we never built,
following paths worn smooth by others' dreams,
their destinations carved in stone we cannot read.

The morning alarm becomes a prayer
to gods we do not worship,
and we rise, dress, move through motions
choreographed by invisible hands.
Coffee tastes like compliance,
commutes feel like pilgrimage
to shrines we never chose to visit.

In meetings, our voices sound foreign
even to ourselves—words shaped
by syllabi we never studied,
speaking languages we learned
by osmosis, by osmosis alone.
We nod at the right moments,
laugh when laughter is expected,
our authentic selves buried so deep
they've forgotten their own names.

The television speaks to empty rooms,
filling silence we're afraid to hear,
because in that silence lives the question we've been running from: Who am I when no one's watching?

And still, the days keep coming—
Tuesday bleeds into Wednesday
like ink on a forgotten page,
the hours unmarked by marvel or memory.
We wake not to greet the sun
but to escape the weight of dreams
that no longer fit inside our tired bones.

Thursday smells of paper and reheated lunch,
a ritual of plastic cutlery and polite smiles,
calendar notifications ringing
like distant church bells in a faithless town.
We answer emails like confessions,
each "per my last message"
a benediction of frustration,
a chant we’ve come to recite
with the faithless reverence of monastic machines.

By Friday our bodies recall another life—
a pulse of rebellion stirring under the skin.
The elevator ride feels like resurrection,
a slow ascent toward soft chairs and fluorescent pens,
but hearts already drift
toward weekend promises we may never keep.
We type as if we’re elsewhere,
living in the hyperlinks between sentences.

Saturday arrives in disguise,
dressing itself in freedom,
pretending to be sanctuary.
We sleep longer, scroll faster,
search for meaning in bottomless timelines.
We text friends we no longer resemble,
making plans we’ll cancel softly,
excuses crafted with the elegance
of poets who have forgotten rhythm.
Laundry tumbles like hours lost,
dishes echo our thoughts—repetitive, unfinished.

Sunday carries silence like a sermon,
coffee warmer than clarity,
sunlight brushing the walls like memory.
We clean rooms to stave off dread,
fold bittersweet into our bedsheets,
prepare sermons of self-help
we need to believe but never speak aloud.
We become prophets of productivity,
trying to baptize our guilt with planners,
hoping routines can redeem
what spontaneity once knew.

And the cycle begins again—
Monday, sharp like a blade unsheathed,
slices through dreams with cold precision.
The mirror greets us with half-familiar eyes,
as if even our reflection
has somewhere else it would rather be.
We pour ourselves into routines
like mortar into cracked walls,
holding up edifices we never asked to build,
hoping no one notices the tremble
in the architecture of our smiles.

Yet somewhere between deadlines
and the dying light of another evening,
a whisper returns, fragile as dew:
What if I am more
than this dance of borrowed hours?
What if the soul isn't meant to survive days,
but to set them on fire—
one by one—until all that remains is truth
glowing like embers in the quiet?

January steps in with resolution,
all sharp edges and fresh notebooks,
its breath cold with the weight of promises
whispered in champagne midnights.
We scribble goals like incantations
onto paper we’ll forget by spring,
hoping the right words
can conjure a better self.
Gyms fill like sanctuaries,
the treadmill another version of penance.
We chant affirmations in mirrors
fogged with doubt,
wearing ambition like armor
too heavy to keep on.

February forgets to bloom.
Its days are brief and brittle,
a gray hush spread across the calendar.
We trade roses and chocolate
to mask the lingering chill.
Love becomes performance,
a card scribbled in someone else’s font.
Even joy feels premeditated,
delivered between meetings and routines
we can’t escape.
We wait for signs of spring,
but get silence for our prayers.

March comes confused—half thaw,
half re-freeze.
It teeters between past and future,
growth and retreat.
We check the weather like fate,
wondering if this will be
the day we bloom,
or wither once again.
Every daffodil feels like a dare.

April lies with a smile.
Sunlight lures us into believing
we've survived the darkest stretch,
but rain still lashes the windows,
and umbrellas double as shields
against all we dare to hope for.
We count puddles
like missed opportunities,
try to laugh it off,
but our laughter slips through cracks—
too rehearsed, too late.

May sings like potential.
The air smells like unopened stories.
We remember how to walk without hunching,
to breathe without bracing.
But joy now takes practice.
We RSVP to barbecues and weddings
with practiced cheer,
but wonder if we’re only
passengers in our own lives,
dressed up for someone else’s plot.

June moves in like a houseguest
we thought we’d enjoy.
But the days stretch too long,
and rest becomes performance.
Vacations feel curated—
sunsets Instagrammed but not remembered.
We smile like the photo depends on it,
then go back to scrolling,
wondering why the content never contented us.
We sleep with the window open
but still wake exhausted.

July is heat and nostalgia,
fireworks and fading songs.
It reminds us of childhood summers
we weren’t present enough to enjoy
the first time.
Now we simulate those memories—
artificial joy,
filtered through apps and sunglasses.
Who are we trying to convince?

August tastes like endings,
even in its heat.
The calendar still says summer,
but we feel the wind leaning westward.
School supply aisles whisper
of structure returning—
Schedules. Systems.
And the creeping return of the self
we thought we’d left behind in June.

September shuffles in,
wearing corduroy and quiet.
The days become measured,
like breaths counted in meditation apps.
There are calendars again.
Routines again.
The neon of summer dims.
We fold sweaters with a sigh we call “relief”
because we forgot how to be unstructured
without falling apart.

October is reflective.
We decorate our fears,
carve faces into pumpkins
so we don’t have to wear our real ones.
We play pretend—
in costume, in kindness,
in acting like we’re okay.
Leaves fall
like old versions of ourselves,
each one letting go
easier than we ever could.

November is a lesson in gratitude,
just shy of convincing.
We gather, feast, express thanks
with mouths half full of doubt.
We hold hands across tables
with people we no longer recognize,
yet need to believe understand us.
We give thanks
for routines we resent—
because at least they are ours.

December is memory’s cathedral.
Strings of lights wind through
nostalgia and expectation.
We perform joy again
in crowded rooms
under mistletoe and inherited ornaments.
The tree knows more about us
than our coworkers.
Every gift carries an apology
we couldn't say aloud.
Music plays that once meant something—
and maybe still does
if we close our eyes long enough.

And the year ends not with clarity
but with curiosity.

As the clock strikes midnight
on yet another year that grew
without our full permission,
a question rises like smoke
from everything left unspoken:

If not now—when?
If not this life—what else?

Are we builders or echoes,
dormant seeds or finished bloom?

Because the months don’t stop.
They wait for no epiphany.
And maybe tomorrow
is exactly the kind of reckoning
we’ve been postponing
too long.