The desk is a swamp

The desk is a swamp.

It grows unpaid invoices like fungus under cheap plywood. It breeds half-full coffee cups when I’m not looking — an ecosystem of caffeine and backwash and the occasional drowned paperclip.

Every sticky note, sticks out like breathless pneumatophores. Every unread email a rustle in the reeds.

I sit here anyway, ankle-deep in deadlines, telling myself I’m working.

Yesterday, I found an old to-do list stuck under the keyboard.

It says “review prototypes” and “call mom” — a fossil from a more optimistic version of me.

I didn’t do either. I fed the swamp instead.

Sometimes, in the half-light at 2 AM, the desk whispers:

“You could leave, you know. Close the laptop. Burn it all. Go outside.”

I never do. Instead I rearrange the weeds, wipe the mold off the keyboard, pour another coffee straight into the mud.

Tomorrow I’ll drain it. Tomorrow I’ll clean it.

Tomorrow I’ll be the sort of designer with a nice plant and a clear mind and a tidy desk.

Tonight I’m just here — knuckle-deep, sketching ideas on damp paper, hoping this swamp is where all the good things grow.