unsatisfactory pencil drawing

 like all unsatisfactory pencil drawings,
this one began as a rough sketch,
more like a scribble, actually,
like some abstract impression of primordial noise.


more strokes were added
out of boredom, because
when there’s nothing to do,
doodle.


and thus the doodle evolved,
sometimes filling the page
with heavy handed lineage,
sometimes being erased
down to ghostlike graphite indentations.


always changing.
always unsatisfactory.


along the way, the doodle met
many photocopy machines
and was reproduced at differing stages,
momentary incarnations committed to inky permanence,
like an image chiseled into stone.


at some point, the doodle developed
self awareness and looked back
at all the hideous forms it had taken.
self loathing quickly followed.


the futility of it’s fickle future
combined with the mockery of it’s past imperfections
caused the doodle to begin entertaining
matchsticks, bunsen burners, and lighters
in hopes of being set ablaze.
but, just before the orgies of fire broke out,
a copy would always arrive
to extinguish all hope.
for the doodle knew that
even if it was reduced to ash,
it would live on
through the copies
and all those that had laid eyes on them.


so, the doodle resigned itself
to become a crumpled wad
in the back of a desk drawer
and patiently waited for the end of the world.
joining the rest of us,
who are too undefined to compose a better future
and lack the creativity to contrive
our own apocalypse.