perfect at the gate

I am trying really hard to make a new life happen

perhaps you could say I am trying too hard

I’m not sure what not trying hard feels like

looks like and if that would ‘turn out’ or not

I was raised to look good, be nice, be kind

Not to compete but to defer and not to mess up

ever

To ‘make sure’ make sure make sure

without a recipe for sure

that things would turn out, whatever that means

I was taught things in code that I’m only now able to

break

I’ve been doing it this way for so long and my neural pathways

are saying give up even as they forge new pathways due

to the wonders of plasticity

and so I tell myself, ‘don’t give up’ words I seldom heard

There is no recipe for sure