Opportunity Bashes in Your Skull

Cast your chance to the wind!
You’ve already got too much luck saved up
from all the opportunities you didn’t take
all those times you refused to stick your neck out
or take one tiptoe onto the tightrope.
You’re bursting with fortune and accidents,
dice glinting in your eyes
and rolling on the back of your tongue.
My God, man,
when are you going to pour your life into your hands?
When will you stop calculating statistics
and leap for the impossible?
Part of the adventure is the bruises,
mistakes made on the wrong path
and written as scars.

Find a way to risk yourself and find yourself!
As giddy laughter bubbles down from your throat,
jump into a cascade of possibilities.
How can you play pretend until you are old,
knitting a life from promises and ragged routines?
Paper can become planes;
Your bones yearn to taste new sky,
the rain of another lifetime on your skin.
My God, man,
too many pennies have fallen into the gutter;
you know better than to keep your fingers
in your pockets.
Scatter stars into the desert
before the sun dares the horizon,
and wonder where you’re going next.

My broken nails and spiderwebbed palms
could fit into your grip, if you want it enough.
Reach out at least once;
you need a story to tell in front of the fire.
There is a sea out there,
fish waiting with mouths full of teeth and pearls,
coral dripping with seaweed,
and I have a boat.