'As I sat there'

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story.  From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.  One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out.  I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose.  I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, 

the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.” 

~Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar, Chapter 7

Hours upon end, 

I simulate this life of mine on repeat, 

until it grew old and stale. 

As for the meaning behind this rote act of mine, 

I attribute it to the boredom of my existence, 

the meaningless of life. 

I say,

that I need this to relieve the tensions of everyday life.

I say,

that I do this because it makes me calm, 

it desensitizes, it abates,

when I cannot deal with this life of mine. 

So I make plans, and give excuses. 

When I know where meaning is,

and where I can find my happiness. 

Now I look up, and see these figs above me,

alive and well. 

But the light distracts me so.

In my chair I sit and let life come to me instead, 

I tell myself I am not lazy:

I will do it later instead.