Unpredictability in the Kaleidoscope

A mediocre (albeit meaningful) poem

Here lies the first real poem I ever wrote.

Vulnerability is rarely enjoyable, but I am in desperate need of practice. There are so many things this current version of me (begrudgingly typing this) would change about the poem below. I read it now and only see its flaws. This is a writer’s curse, of course, to continually criticize every sentence they have ever strung together.

But from a different angle, a more optimistic light, I’m proud of this piece. It was the first to drag me from my comfort zone. I fell in love with poetry after daring to attempt it. So for that reason, I would not change a thing.

Kaleidoscope

Life is a collage of consistencies

A continuous cycle of riveting reliability we relive

Where bleak and bliss begin to blur.

There’s a certain power in predictability, in the knowledge of the inevitable.

How is it that the future is a mystery when I continue to relive the past?

I expect the sun to rise just as I expect my shoelaces to untie and coffee to burn my tongue.

Even the sky cries, predictable in the way it mourns the sun.

Every day we’re wrapped in a series of shapes, sounds, and colors

But even the most chaotic kaleidoscopes have patterns.

In this lies the mundanity of mankind.

Dogs will bark, flames will burn, mouths will smile.

Consistency is the most valuable currency, control a crutch.

How can one fear the future when they’ve fooled fate, expected every outcome?

So, on and on the planet spins like the predictable kaleidoscope it is.

Another sunrise, another shoelace untied, another sip of coffee burning my tongue.

So why didn’t I predict the unpredictability that is you?

With a tiny twist of the kaleidoscope,

A single shift,

You sent my world spinning, control slipping, thoughts spiraling.

Another twist of the kaleidoscope and you managed to interrupt mundanity,

Slipping between the fingers I have clutched so tightly around my determined destiny.

Another twist of the kaleidoscope and you’re suddenly the only color within it worth admiring.

Well, this is not the future I had foreseen.

The one I’d so foolishly foretold had not involved such an interruption in my inevitability.

You’ve shaken me, my schedule, my stubborn need to be independent.

I had expected the sun to rise and paint the sky scarlet, but not for my cheeks to match in the midst of a teasing conversation.

I had expected my shoelace to untie, but not for someone to bow and tie it in a bow before me.

I had expected coffee to burn my tongue, but not to be drinking it across from someone who knows my order by heart.

I had expected everything but the essence of you.

With nothing but a single twist of the kaleidoscope, my carefully crafted collage of consistency has cracked,

Shattered into startling shards of colors and unpredictable patterns.

I’m stumbling without my sense of control for a crutch

Limping off the path of predictability to follow the beat of my heart that has become the only constant in life,

The steady drum I march on to.

It’s terrifying, being so exposed to the unexpected.

Part of me wants to spin the kaleidoscope and set my world back into its mundane motion,

Where certainty is the recipe for living carefree.

Oh, but the other part of me can’t imagine living in a world without the vibrance that is you.

I used to think I thrived on being in control but that was before the control you have on me made me flourish.

I’m no longer plagued by predictability when I’m in your presence.

Another day, another predetermined 24 hours, and yet every moment is spent marveling at the mystery that is you.

The day you become predictable is the day I’ve expected the unexpected,

The day your significance no longer startles me.

In you, I find thrill in mundanity.

In you, I find unpredictability in the kaleidoscope.

Sharing these poems will always be terrifyingly vulnerable, but I hope you enjoy seeing the more intimate details of me. There are more yaps/updates to come, but I’m currently traversing Europe and meeting so many of you! I love talking to you all - the community we have is so special. Thank you for all the love and support! Talk soon!

XO, Lauren

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