Undeservedness

It is only months later that i realise
How long i have spent without
hate for myself
for long
and how it felt to forget that.

I now see a cold oily skin
sallow red eyes
hair i don't even like
automatisms that i walk in and out of
all day and all night
a stodgy body and a walking style
belonging to a sailor.

i had learnt earlier
when things looked like this
that the pleasant fuzzy optimism of
childhood
was a false lie.

I know.
How it feels to loathe
where i have brought things to be
how naive and enchanted
i'd have had to be

to have been saying and minting
positive feelings and optimism
about a decidedly bleak future

that stares down when i look at
sparse basic abilities
coupled with a lack of hard work.

How intoxicated i'd have had to be
to convince myself of deserving
pleasures that fell upon me
by a sheer combination of luck,
coincidence and proximity.

There was nothing i had done
to deserve fragrance.
speed. music.
Here they still are, in my life
mocking me not from their beauty
but from my incapabilities
and undeservedness.