Q In A Queue

From where you stand,

you are always the last in the queue.

Not metaphorically.

Practically.

The line behaves like it ends with you.

It always does that trick.

It learns your perspective and pretends to agree.

You look back and see nothing but continuation.

You look forward and see only justification.

So you assume:

this is where life stops distributing itself.

But queues are dishonest in a very democratic way.

They extend equally after you, as they did before you.

They just refuse to announce it.

From where you stand, you are the end of something.

From where you are not looking, you are only a middle.

And that is the first quiet violence of perspective.

You forget a simple thing:

You are not the observer of the line.

You are inside it.

Someone behind you is learning your shape as “front.”

Someone ahead of you is learning your existence as “delay.”

You are not outside the story watching it happen.

You are the reason someone else believes there is a story at all.

And yet, you still think in singular terms.

I.

Me.

Here.

As if the line has agreed to isolate you.

But the line is a lie that only works when it is believed locally.

Because for the one behind you,

you are not a witness.

You are obstruction.

For the one ahead of you,

you are already background noise.

So where exactly are you?

Not at the end.

Not at the beginning.

A position that only exists because you cannot see yourself continuing.

That is how most lives function.

As endings that have not yet noticed they are being extended.

And for the one behind you,

you are already what waiting looks like.

For the one ahead of you,

you are what impatience becomes.

And still, you think you are simply waiting.