Today I felt my skin turn to bark as I leaned against a tree. I felt a warmth spread through me as I reveled in joy of hidden things. I watched people pass me by, had a conversation with a few people perceptive enough to notice my fringes.
They said hello. You are difficult to notice.
I nodded silent thanks.
Why don't you speak?
This is how I thought. You're asking a man nearly imperceptible why he stands so still.
At times the bark or grass fell from me replaced with concrete or off-white plaster or the likeness of another. I stood and watched as I smiled, talked, acted, convinced, spoke from the heart, and not a souls suspects.
When I feel like hiding, this is what happens: I become everyone. I become no one. I am tasteless, odorless, bland. I become no one, but not the kind of no one that gets noticed. I see that the truly homogeneous hide twofold, sixfold, eightfold. I hide that I am hiding that I am hiding that –
Continuum. I become a vacuum of character, perfectly unremarkable.
This is whenever I feel like it.
Whenever I want it, my outline becomes harsh, sharply black against white against black leading to my deadened surface made vibrant by desire, by necessity, by conscious appraisal of the path of least resistance. Feeling clashes with wanting, the cacophony is maddening where such fragile melodies had once been harmonic. All of a sudden it is clear that I am hiding. I can no longer conceal the bare bones sprouting from my shoulders, clumsily fashioned into bare outlines of wings. All of a sudden I am laid bare, and the unfinished construct is revealed. Everything looked wonderful, immaculate, meticulously attended, even upon close inspection, until the keystone shook loose. Can't find adhesive that lasts more than a few months these days. My fragile creation appearing bold and strong, emanating vitality such that it can be gleaned with proximity, fell.
All I can see are my feet or darkness.
I cannot produce sound more substantial than murmurs.
I cannot clothe myself but with scraps of cloth that fall with the most gentle breath of wind, but still I toil.
The spectacle as it has become is made piteous by the clarity with which I am seen. My futile attempts to recover myself incite anger and pity. They fade, and sadness remains. I am in plain sight, as if illuminated by some unseen light, and I am understood. It is understood that I will continue affixing the fragile scraps to me until they stay. It is seen that I am undaunted by such a seemingly insurmountable task. After eons of exposure to the eyes of all, a scrap grafts itself again to my bare flesh. My lips spread slowly into a wicked grin – for it is known. It is known that those witnessing this disgusting degree of satisfaction at my own partial concealment will soon forget the fissured and sickly creature they now behold. They will soon forget what stood in the place of the great statue now erected around me.
Inside, I stand in fear of the day when again I must build myself anew.
Like a bird constructing its fragile nest, I take everything I can use. My toil is patient...careful. I refine tirelessly. The light turns hard and flat, but still I am great and formidable in my fragile, meticulous, manufactured splendor.
One who remembers sees this, and knows that this is my true love.
One among them all remembers.
He is the closest thing I have to a friend.
