There are seasons that revolve around the nature of this building, times when the core creaks ever so slightly, the time when the walls are cold or warm to the touch. When the window is slightly fogged. When the concrete floors creak and the wood floors are quiet. When the elevators take forever, or when the elevator is waiting for you.
Everything has its own seasons.
Sometimes, I am happy, sometimes I am cold. Sometimes it’s too warm for me and I feel sick. I had two doughnuts this morning. A cup of coffee. A cup of tea. I am hungry but I don’t want food. My hands have been cold. I’ve been busy. My mood has been low. I have been angry, and I’ve hated the feeling of it.
This is a season.
I grew up in between cities,
and both places I called Home were wide expanses of nothing that
whistled with nothingness
and still faintly whistle now
like debris caught at the edge of the barbed wire fences that
dragged across the back seat window of our car.
Living in the moment goes so quickly, with every moment full and accounted for
in contrast with an hour and a half daily commute each way
across flat low highways
past homes that belonged to other families
between two houses that never really belonged to me.
There was a time that it was possible to move ceaselessly
and not worry about the consequences.
Or consequence, singular.
This isn’t that time.
I
(We)
will never know anything
except for semi-permanence
and histories that don’t belong to us.
Her
story
His
story
it will never be
Our
story
because I will never understand You.
We only matter in groups
in astronomical numbers
in mobs, angry or otherwise
in victims of genocide
at the point that they deserve news coverage
in nationalities
in statistics
in what We stand for.
and that is what spans
the distance between
Us
and is the pull
to the ground
that I feel
when I stand too
high up
and wonder why
We continue.
When I met you, we had no way to make right angles, because there are no 90-degree angles in nature. There are no squares in nature either, but I swear every side we shared was the same length.
My mind is too large to focus right now, and this is a state of unbalance. When your surroundings are so large that you feel insignificant, it provides alternate perspective. Unfortunately, this requires opening your eyes. It isn’t always possible.
Because of the way molecules fit together, nothing ever touches anything else. So maybe it’s silly to reach for the things I do, but I don’t see an alternative. If no one can touch anything, then it makes sense that as close as has to be good enough.
(beat.)
I used to imagine that there was a physical spot in my body for my metaphorical heart.
A dark space in the corner between the far wall of my stomach and my spinal cord.
When I cared a lot about something, I would put it there, and I would feel something, like I had actually stored the idea somewhere safe.
When you put everything in one place, after a while it begins to combine and spill out where it’s not invited
Raw emotion manifests in positive and negative energy at the same time and this is duality.
This is crying when I am not sad.
Raw is the shiver you get, before the pain, when something scrapes an open wound.
Meditate here for a while. Things are only important when you decide they can be.
beat.
Within a week, the lake is frozen.
In the stillness
I look at myself and recognize that change
isn’t accompanied by fanfare but rather
looking in the mirror every day and realizing
your hair is longer
your ears are larger
your eyes speak a new language
and you have to relearn your own story.
No one will hand you a way to break any frozen sea.
You have to seek it,
and ultimately, your hands have to be the ones to swing the axe.
If the sun set behind square mountains, a sunset would be a trapezoid instead of a semi-circle.
The dust from the desert blows past and wonders aloud at your gaping face, and coats your tongue as a coarse reminder to shut your mouth and just watch.
