the small things i found amidst chaos

and after she drank down the last bitter dregs of humanity

she could stagger towards home, rip off her shoes and

think about life for a while

she associated summer with saturation

speckled sunlight turned leaves into chartreuse celestial deities

glowing faintly under a periwinkle sky

and in those moments where time itself lingered in

the dusty compartment between chaos and serenity

she could see the colour of water, which, like

everything else, had saturated in the blanketed heat of july

and maybe it was her imagination, but

early morning stirred in her the most isolated sense of life

a spot in which she could reflect and ruminate

a place where she became the only wandering soul

left on the planet, a moment captured in slow motion, a

dream strung together from melancholic memories

for only a few moments

before the sun rose

she was someone who sat in the backs of cafes, her

bookbag cluttered with crushed volumes, marked

in pencil and ringed with old coffee stains

someone who regarded the coffeehouse singer's plaintive voice

with something like admiration, who thought the lyrics an argument

and respectfully made her own claims, who kept

poetic nonsense scribbled in pen on her arms and ensured

the singer could see her caffeine-stimulated eyes

supporting them with every blink and breath

and maybe when chaos overthrew that strange, suspended serenity, collected

itself into a pill and dropped into her glass of humanity

she could distract the chaos by thinking of the small things

because the big things could smash her life apart

and the small things would bring it back