I sift through a sea of pebbles—coarse grit and polished faces. This is how it feels to touch memories that have long faded—photographs with white edges and yellow corners. Perhaps here in this infinitesimal rivulet of cumulated sand, perhaps here I once was in hell. My skin remembers these tiny details—the claw-like pinpricks of granule and stone as they swim into the gaps of my fingers. And here come the worn but smooth edges.

Longing for the past should not be called anticipation, but it paints the back of my throat with the taste of salt and sugar and leaves. But the long winding path leading to more pebbles is masked by the ceaseless onslaught of undertow, fascia rippling as if shaken by quakes not just of the earth.

I wait for the tide to calm, for obscurity of undulation to halt. I am still waiting. I want to see what is beyond. I will touch the images from before as if they have tangible form. I can still taste the sea.

But I want to see what the rest of the river is like. I want to know the future.