Fallen for the Metric System

I sat in the shade of two kinds of tree atop the southeastern corner of a temple, across a canopy sea of green, and rode the tide and swells of tourists plying themselves up the sacrificial steps, to steal their own souls into selfies and cameras loaned to strangers.

I stayed until one hundred clouds had passed over the temple peak a kilometer away.

I had fallen for the metric system.

I had tried to meditate.

I stayed 10 times longer than anyone else.

Why would they leave, except for hunger?

I was here and already sad to leave — this tension at the heart of life — a reconciliation or acceptance to make ideally as immediately, permanently, and perpetually reformed like the sacrifices that would fall to the northern side.

There is only one sacrifice to make. Time.