GOING NOWHERE

I’ve been here before
and can give it a name,
technically.
It’s old as the hills, so familiar:
this feeling of trappedness
knotted in my belly
- an upwelling tide of bile,
of frustration and rage
with no-where to turn,
way on, out or back.
Will, stymied.

Who said or thought
We are masters of our own fate
Self-propelled Controllers of our destiny
Deciders of direction?

And yet, if not
who concluded
we are helpless victims,
Volition-less cogs, automata
reflex mechanisms
without options or opinions
let alone power to choose?

All I know is this tumult in my gut
is ancient and familiar.
Am I supposed to have instigated it,
somewhere/when, set in motion
this sequence, timing, placement?
Chosen this?
Responsible for?
deserving of?

Like treading water, going no-where
or worse, sucked into a vortex,
a pit of stuckedness.
Cornered and confronted with
personal futility and transience
and total absence of hope or point.
No-where to go.