It Hasn't Happened Yet

I walked through the wading pond in front of the Super Dome.
It was Thanksgiving, but I wasn't invited home
to celebrate with the rest of my family.  I was waiting to hear
from my pop, but wasn't holding out hope
and I was broke, even with a full wallet.  I learned
what it truly meant to be broke that day.  There were nods my way,
a smile, a glance that seemed to know
the emotions my face could never show.  I would be famous if it killed me,
I'd make history.  I'd make my daddy notice me.
It hasn't happened yet.

And it's funny.
A Louisiana Fall feels a lot like a North Carolina summer,
just humid enough to drive you crazy but not hot enough to keep you inside.
It was good wandering weather, in the aftermath of the storm.  And the homeless men
who congregate in front of the Saints stadium like a cathedral
make good company, the only strangers in a strange land I needed to feel lost.
I needed to feel lost so I could find myself.  And my cell phone rang.
You can take the call but then you have to deal with the awkward moment
when you ask who they're calling for only to realize it's you.
I would find my identity.  My family would not know my name better than me.
It hasn't happened yet.

And the silence is only as deafening as the noise that created it.
You can hear the thunderous applause as poets play packed theaters
or half-empty bookstores but at the end of the day they sound the same to me.
Snaps can't change the world but they move each individual that does it
and that can get the ball rolling; farbeit for me to me to say where it stops.

I was drowning in knee-deep water in the midst of a natural disaster
and I started chugging.  Unable to maneuver through the muck to the front gate,
I was wondering how I got there.  Buried two feet under an inch of rain
and one foot eleven inches of good intentions and bad execution.
I could feel myself dying, unfulfilled aspirations and lost self.
I could feel myself wondering.  What am I doing?  Where have I been?
Is there a way out and which way do I begin?  I was looking
for my last breath, and my soul.  I could feel myself fading
but still searching.  Staying, but still going.  Dying, but still living.
I was trying to grasp my fate in the palm of my hand and I knew
it was over but,
it hasn't happened yet.