Gravel

like treading quicksand, this head full of cement. too much thinking about how a day could contort, twisting back in on itself around one fictional person while still managing not to tear, to remain consistent. and, how impressive that the poor man himself retains sanity! perhaps the most unbelievable bit. SO, let's regress. or, rather, retrace steps, some taken blindly, led by sympathetic chords? i clearly know the route to that field i watch change in the seasons, but never where. i could say california, or new mexico, or wisconsin, or japan, or russia, kashmir, maybe new england, but it's older than that, more primal than steps i took in youth or not at all, something spoken eloquently in the fading choir of seagulls, in the distant calls of trains, in the slow surrender of winter's grip. it barely averages fifty most afternoons, and already i have been taken to see that manicured hillside, to see the pale greens and yellows of spring coming into focus, to run my fingers amongst dew-soaked grass and smell the glory of life in action, and as a result this fire of summer is already kindled, later nights and earlier mornings, as if with more waking hours i could finally learn the lessons of warmth and, thus, coax it into staying.

trying to coax out that hazy half-sleep, that almost-dreaming that spawns such glorious melodies immediately forgotten but for their intricacy, for their familiar tones, for the strings of memory they tighten, tune, and pluck. these songs are from the throats of angels, great winged divines acknowledging my sadness as their own, justified, permissable in the grand scheme, or Grand Scheme. they say, it's okay you gave up comfort for a shot at true happiness, certainty for the joy of learning from your own mistakes, a halo and sword for pure humanity, gross and exhilerating, enlightenment via the great muddy road of doubt and fear and confusion, a road we muddied ourselves. and, somewhere in that holy choir, there is the voice of the one i seek, so hard to single out, too many failing yesterdays to sift gently aside, gently, gently lest they draw me into this dream or that, plucking me from these treasured borderlands to put me to task for imaginary slights and mistaken identities, no, pushing through the fade, i hear her faintly, one voice not particularly louder or softer, not angry or disenfranchised or sad or joyous or content, neither at ease nor afraid. one voice, whose every note screams of life and live, of dreams forgotten since birth, one unpained angel, singing as she sits on a rock, the only concrete thing in sight, gazing into lonely space with eyes that would let me put off yesterday and forget about tomorrow, yeah her face is uncertain but that's because she's everyone, or at least every perfect one, so no one at all, impossible, but there she sits, holy and lonely, i catch glimpses, moments, flybys, but her head does not lift, yeah she knows i am there for i have always been there, yeah i know she is there for she has always been there, i too am a part of always, all ways, and all. and she waits for my return, and i wait for the road to lead me home to her, the world brightens as our celestial reunion shakes stardust down to bless the upturned faces of lovers in the streets, lovers on balconies, lovers in boats, lovers on horseback, lovers sharing traditional kisses barefoot on the beach beneath fireworks, lovers on ferris wheels, lovers huddled under bombed out roofs. and after we have shaken the heavens with our love, and eternity's bliss has risen high, she will depart and i will remain, each to learn more of what it means to have, of what it means to not, of what it means.

...and this is the path i have chosen, where the love is spent all wrong, where every tragedy only warrants the briefest of acknowledgments, no coping or dealing, no time, running forward into the failing light, try hard not to stare into the abysses, Odysseus' bane, not just black but a pupil, no nothing worth learning but another way not to live...