Sliver of a Moon



    On this wishful Easter-eve
    A light meal accomplished,
    Moonlit twilight serenade
    Enticing,
    Is
    A fine
    Sliver of a moon.
    Entrancing
    Starlit, wispy,
    Just enough
    On a cool clear evening
    Is
    A sliver of a moon.
    Just enough
    For a wonderful end to
    A light meal,
    A starry night  
    Under
    A sliver of a moon
    Marvelous for a moon dance
    On this wishful Easter-eve.




    Paul Lefever


Easter Eve,   rev 2011

It was 98'.
No, it was 99'.
That was the year.
Yeah, that was the year.

I had just landed abroad and knew no one.
Well, I was there with my girlfriend, Page.

I knew her.

We had to get out of the states.
There was nothing for us there.
We were drowning in that nothingness - that lacking future.

Cookie cutters everywhere.

Everything I saw was like an outline of something that had already happened.
I couldn't sleep.
I couldn't ****.
I could barely call my parents to let them know what I was doing.

Nothing really.

Floating downward like a leaf broken from its stem.
I was scared.
I'll admit it.
I was terrified of the next four years.
Twenty-five seemed so far away and so close, all at the same time.

We had a found an apartment to live in while in the U.S.
We were lucky because people we met later on said it was hell trying to find a place after arriving.
I was never too good at that stuff anyway.
I always felt like people were trying to cheat me or something.

It was small.
You would have said you loved it, but secretly hated it.
One could barely stand in the shower.
Want to spread your arms wide?

Forget about it.

There was a balcony though and you could watch the street traffic from above.
People look so small when your high up.
Down the street, there was a large theatre where they filmed movies.
I rarely saw them shooting, but I could tell it was a good place to.
It was beautiful at night when the lampposts would flicker on, orange spilling on the street.
Everything was damp in the Fall when we first arrived.

"What do you want to do today?" I asked her. She was laying face down on the bed.
Whenever she was hungover, she would do that.
All the covers and pillows over her face, blocking out the world and its light.
I did the same thing, so I couldn't really say much.
We were hungover a lot those first couple months.
Then came the jobs and everything changed...mostly.

She moaned something that I couldn't understand.
I was standing by the window, staring at the pigeons and crows perched on the roof across from us.
They had made a little nest under one of the shingles.
Clever little ******'s.

"Look at those things," I said.
The coffee I was drinking was bitter and made from crystals.
It gave me a headache, but it was cheap and we were broke.
I stepped back to get a better look at their nest and knocked an empty beer bottle around.

She moaned again and rose up from bed, kind of like a stretching kitten or a cat.
Her back was arched like a crescent moon and she stunk of ***** and Sprite.
The blankets were twisted and crumpled and she was tangled in them like a fly in a spiders web.
I went into the kitchen and poured out my coffee, thinking of what to do with the day.

"Breakfast?" she asked me from bed.
My back was to her, but I knew she wanted me to make it.
I put the electric stove on and opened the refrigerator.

"No eggs," I said back to her, "I'll be right back."

She moaned and slithered back into bed.
I threw my jacket and slippers on and made my way downstairs.

"Dobry den," I said to the cashier.
He was a tiny vietnamese man with a extremely high pitched voice.
I struggled to stifle a laugh every time I came in.

"Dobry den," he said back, sounding like air escaping from a balloon.

"Dear God," I thought, "How does his voice box do it?"

I went straight to the eggs, pretending to cough.
All around me were packaged sweets and rotten vegetables and fruit.
There were half loaves of brown, stale bread wrapped lazily in thin plastic.
Canned beans, noodle packets, and cardboard infused orange juice lined the shelves.
Where were the ******* eggs?
We needed milk too.
Trying to drink that crystalized coffee without it was torture.
I don't even know how I did it earlier.
"I must be getting used to the taste..." I thought.

I opened the single refrigerator they had in the place.
It was stocked with loosely packaged cheese, milk, beer, and soda.
There they were, those ******* eggs, right next to the yogurt.
I looked at the expiration date of a small carton of chocolate milk and winced.
"Someone could die here if they weren't careful," I whispered to myself.

"Everyding O.K.?" I heard the cashier squeak behind me.
I turned and nodded and showed him the eggs.
He was suspicious I was stealing something.
It was ironic.
I put the eggs on the counter and handed over what the cash register told me.

"There you go," I said and handed him the 58 crown in exact change.

"Děkuji," he peeped.

His voice sounded like a stuffed animal.
I nodded, smiled, and quickly got the hell out of there.

"You know the guy that works at the shop across the street?" I asked the body still in bed.
Well, she was up now, back up against the wall with her laptop on her lap.
"You mean the guy that has the voice of a little girl?"
"Exactly. I was just in there - getting these eggs - and I nearly laughed in his face."
"That's mean," she frowned, staring at her laptop.
Many of our conversations were with some kind of electronic device in between us.
We needed to work on that.
"I didn't laugh at him directly."
She smiled and nodded and moved down the bed a little more.
Only her head was resting on the pillow.
I cracked two eggs and let them sizzle there in the butter and the salt.

"So, what do you want to do today?" I asked Page, "It's not too cold out. We could go on a walk."
"Where?"
"I don't know. Over the bridge and maybe down by the water."
"It's going to be so cold," she shivered.
"I was just out there in slippers and a t-shirt and I was fine."
"That's because you're so big. I'm tiny. I don't get as much blood flow."

I flipped the two eggs and looked down at them.
Golden and burnt slightly around the edges.
******* perfect.
Now, just gotta wait a little on the other side and make sure to not let the yolk harden.
I hated that more than anything in the world.
Well, that and hearing **** poor excuses like it being too cold.
It was nice out.
She'd be fine.

"Come on," I sighed. I did that a lot. "It'll be fun."
She looked up at me from her computer with a dead look in her eye.
"What?" I asked her.
"You're such a...nerd," she said.
"No I'm not."
"You're so weird. Some of the things you say sometimes..."
"Like what?"
"Let's go on a walk."
She exaggerated the word walk.
I laughed and knew I was being a little too excited about a walk.
"Yeah. So? What are you doing? You're just laying there doing nothing."
"It's my day off," she scoffed, jokingly.

We were unemployed.
Everyday was a day off.
This was not something to bring up.
It was touchy subject.
One had to go about it...delicately.

"We need to find jobs," I stated, "And we can probably ask around or look for signs in windows."

"Oh JESUS," she gagged, coughing and diving back under the covers.

"I'm just thinking ahead so we can stay here. There's got to be something out there we can do."

"Like what?" she asked, her voice muffled by blankets.

"I don't know...something," I mumbled, trailing off as I flipped one of the eggs, "Perfect."

After breakfast, Page finally got out of bed and took a shower.
I tried to sneak in there with her, but, like I said before, one could barely fit themselves in there.
We compromised to have *** on the bed, though I did miss doing it in the shower.
As Page got dressed, I watched her slip those thin black stockings on, half reading a magazine.
I had gotten a subscription to The Review because I was trying to become a writer.
I thought, maybe if I read the stuff getting published - even the bad **** - it'll help.
Later, I realized, this was a terrible idea, but I enjoyed the magazine all the same.
Page finished getting dressed.
I jumped into whatever clothes were on the floor and didn't stink.
Then, we were out the door on Anna Letenske street, looking at the tram, downhill.


"I can see my breath," Page said, "It's cold..."

"Alright," I said as both of us ran across the street, "It's a little cold."

"But it's ok because I'm glad were out of the house."

"If we would have festered there any longer, we would have stayed in there all day."

"And missed this beautiful day," she said mocking me, putting both of her arms in the air.

The sky was gray and overcast and a single black crow flew over us, roof to roof.
No one was out, really.
It was Sunday and no one ever really came out on Sundays.
From the few czech friends I had, they explained to me this was the day to get drunk and cook.

"Far different then what people think in the States to do," I remember telling him.
"What do you do, my friend?" he had asked. He always called me my friend.
It was a nice thing to do since we had only known each other a couple weeks.
"Well," I explained to him, "Some people go to church to pray to God."
He laughed when I said this and said, "HA! God? How many people believe in God there?"
I had heard through the news and some Wikipedia research Prague was mostly atheist.
"A good amount, I'm pretty sure."
"That's silly," he scoffed, "Silly is word, right?"
"Yep. A word as any other."
"I like that word. What else do they do on Sunday?"
"A lot of people watch football. Not like soccer but with..."
"I know what you talk about," he said, cutting me off, "With the ball shaped like egg?"
I nodded, "Yes, the one with the egg shaped ball. It's popular in the Fall on Sundays."
"And what is Fall?" he asked.
You can see our relationship was really based on questions and answers.
He was a good guy, though I could never pronounce his name right.
There was a specific z in there somewhere where one had to dig their tongue under their teeth.
Lots of breath and vibration that Americans were never asked or trained to do.
Every czech I met said our language was a high contradiction.
Extremely complex in grammar and spelling, but spoken with such sloth.
I don't know if they used the word sloth.
I just like the word.

As we waited for the tram, I noticed the burnt orange and red blood leaves on the ground.
"Where had they come from?" I wondered. There were no trees on the street.
Must be from the park down the block, the one with the big church and the square.
There were lines of trees there used as leaning posts for the bums and junkies as they waited.
What they were waiting for, I never knew.
They just looked to be waiting for something.
I kicked a leaf into the street from the small island platform for the tram.
It swept up into the air a couple inches, and then instantly, was swept away by a passing car.
I watched as it wavered in the air, settling down the block in the middle of the road.

"Where's this trammm," Page complained.
Whenever it was cold out, her complaining level multiplied by a million.
"Should be coming soon. Check the schedule."
"Too cold," she said, "Need to keep my hands in my pockets."
I shook my head and looked at the schedule. It said it would be there at 11:35.
"11:35," I told her, still looking at the schedule. There was a strange cross over the day of Sunday.
"You mad?"
"No," I said turning to her, "I just want to have a nice day and its hard when you're upset."
"I'm not upset," she said, her teeth chattering behind her lips.
"Complaining I mean. We can go back home if it's really too cold. It's right there."
"No," she looked down, "Let's go out for a bit. I just don't know how long I'll last."
"Ok," I shrugged.
I looked up the street and saw our tram coming; number 11.
"There it is," I said.
"Thank God," Page exhaled, "I feel like I'm about to die."

Even the tram was sparse with people.
An empty handle of cheap liquor rattled in the back somewhere.
I heard it rock back and forth against the legs of a metal seat.
"Someone had a night last night," I thought, "Hope that's not mine."
We had gone to some dark bar with a lot of stairs going down - all I really recall.
Beer was so **** cheap there and there was always so much of it, one got very drunk easily.
I couldn't even really remember who we met or why we went there.
When everything's a blur in the morning you have two choices:
Feel guilty about how much you drank, lie around, and do nothing or,
Leave it be, try not to think about it, and try and find your passport and cell phone.

We made our transfer at the 22 and rode downhill.
Page looked like she was going to be sick.
Her sunglasses were solid black and I couldn't see her eyes, but her face was flushed and green.
"You alright?" I asked her.
"I'm fine," she said, "Just need to get off of this tram. Feel like I'm going to be sick."
"You look it."
"Really?" she asked.
"Yeah, a little bit."
"Let's get off at the park with the fountain. I don't want to puke here."
"Ok," I said, smiling, "We'll get off after this stop."

We sat down on one of the benches that circled around the fountain.
It was empty and Page was confused why.
"Maybe to save money?" I suggested.
"What? It's just water."
"Well, you gotta' pump the water up there and then filter it back out. Costs money."
"Costs crown," she corrected me.
"Same thing," I said, putting my arm around her, "There's no one here today."
"I know why," she stated, flatly.
"Why?"
"Because it's collllllllld and it's Sunday and only foreigner's would go out on a day like this."
I scanned the park and noticed that most of the faces there were probably not Czech.
"****," I muttered, "You may be right."
"I know I am," she said, wiggling her chin down into her jacket, "We're...crzzzy."
"We're what?" I asked. I couldn't hear her through her jacket.
She just shook her head back and forth and looked forward, not wanting to move from the warmth.
Dogs were scattered around the brown green grass with their owners.
Some were playing catch with sticks or *****, but others were just following behind their owner's.
I watched as one took a crap in the center of the walkway near the street.
Its owner was typing something on their phone, ignoring what was happening in front of him.
After the dog finished, the owner looked down at the crap, looked around, then slunk off.

"Did you see that?" I asked Page, pointing to where the owner had left the mess.
"Yeah," she nodded, "So gross. That would never fly in the states."
"You'd get shoulder tackled by some park security guard and thrown in jail."
"And be given a fat ticket," she said, coughing a little, "Let's get out of here."
"Yeah," I agreed, "And watch for any **** on the way out of here."

We made our way out of the park and down the street where the 22 continues on to the center.
"Let's not go into the center. Let's walk along the water's edge and maybe up to the bridge."
"Ok," I said, "That's a good idea." I didn't want to get stuck in that mass of tourists.
I could tell Page didn't either. I think she was afraid she might puke on a huddle of them.
We turned down a side street before the large grocery store and avoided a herd of people.
The cobble stones were wet and slick, glistening from a small sliver of sunlight through the clouds.
Page walked ahead.
Sometimes, when we walked downtown in the older parts of Prague, we would walk alone.
Not because we were fighting or anything like that; it was all very natural.
I would walk ahead because I saw something and she would either come with or not.
She would do the same and we both knew that we wouldn't go too far without the other.
I think we both knew that we would be back after seeing what we had wanted to see.
One could call it trust - one could call it a lot of things - but this was not really spoken about.
We knew we would be back after some time and had seen what we had wanted to.
Thinking about this, I watched her look up at the peeling paint of the old buildings.
Her thick black hair waved back and forth behind her plum colored pea coat.
Page would usually bring a camera and take pictures of these things, but she had forgotten it.
I wished she hadn't.
It was turning out to be such a beautiful day.

We made it to the Vlatva river and leaned over the railing, looking down at the water.
Floating there were empty beer bottles and plastic soda jugs.
The water was brown, murky, and looked like someone had dumped a large bag of dirt in there.
There was nothing very romantic about it, which one would think if you saw it in a picture.
"The water looks disgusting," Page said.
"That it does, but look at the bridge. It looks pretty good right

Unlike a sliver of cake
That sliver of hope
Made me feel whole
Complete
But then
The realization hit
And that little sliver
Turned into
Numbness

Slogging through endless Whitman prose and I have to make little marks
on the pages every 8 to 14 lines as my mind will not quit the wandering roam.
Blanket paragraphs blend into infinite droll, never ending whine-fest of bull
jazz…jazz singers fill the empty spaces between
the lines of drivel.

The dog barks on the veranda looking old and sad in the wind,
The water trickles through a series of rusted and holey pipes… peeling
asbestos laden lead paint tricks the mouths of children… a sick cat heaves near the Chesterfield.

Finding myself no longer interested in freelance fodder, I real from one daydream to the next
without enough pause to subconsciously journal… a subcutaneous oak shard
gives a slight reddish bump to my well defined forearm,
slight pressure sends nearly transparent ****
screaming from its melanin tomb.
The sliver remains diligent.

The sliver holds its ground,
The sliver has a new home,
The sliver wants to die here,
and never again travel the long lonesome forest road,
The sliver shines silver in the sunlight,
I shiver at the sight.

Sliver silver
The nighttime I walk beneath bewilders
And with the skin of my neck prickled with shivers
We walk towards the water
The moonlight to me shimmers
Upon that which I seek neath ocular moon and few stars
They see widely but I see the swoon
Of the moon on the river flow swift
And wither I meet it with wits about this body
I know not yet since
My skin it so shivers and slivers of mist
Caress my wet cheek that’s collected its breath.

Towards river I go and hope there be boats
At least one under bridge held fast by its rope
Where I pray go as I find my fate has so wrote
And under moon so bright it shines fore my face,
This mist be sweat from my brow dripped into my mouth
For the salt it doth leave on my lips for my tongue to run
Upon the road that I walk there hangs a mist
But a sliver that follows in my very midst
And each step I take that draws the river to me near
My heart quickens and blood thickens
For my shroud I cannot shrug.

But facing this silver moon I will never turn back
It pulls me in closer to watch as it slides and shivers on swift river
Upon which my liking I see eerily shimmers
I am the water and I am the mist
And there is the boat where my fate is writ
Tied fast with its rope quite under the bridge
To shroud it’s oarsmen on this night
Which be lit by the opal moon’s bright torch light

Here I will go and fate I will find
The mist follows with me away from the shine
Now I am the water and I am the mist
No sliver silver upon me shall sit
Until the books of this time have ended their script.

“It really is,” I whispered, “It really is a beautiful world."


     “This really doesn’t feel safe,” Jamie said, her voice holding just a hint of fear. She was probably right. By anyone’s standards, this was straight up stupid, and here I had convinced her to come along with me.
     “Nah it’s totally fine. I wouldn’t do anything to put you in too much danger.” I said this without a hint of doubt in my voice, confident as usual. I had to keep the fearless and confident image or she might change her mind. I hoped the risk would be worth it in the end, but I couldn’t really be sure. How could I know unless I tried? If I didn’t try, I would just be left wondering how great it might have been.
     “We are really freaking high.” This time Jamie said it deadpan, more of an emotionless observation than anything else. Again, she was right. I looked down the long white ladder past her. It was probably 80 yards to the ground from where we were. Above us was another 20 yards of ladder, leading up to a narrow platform. We were climbing a water tower. The platform above us circled around the tower just below where it began to bulge outward into a spherical shape at the top. There was no safety cage around us, nothing to break our fall except for the climbing harnesses we wore. Each harness had two straps, each with a clip on the end. One clip would be snapped onto the first rung, then the next clip to the second, and so forth until we reached the top. It wasn’t fool proof but it was better than nothing.
     “But seriously my hands are getting tired. How much further is it?” Jamie was great, but complaining was one of her most annoying flaws. Most people wouldn’t have made it this far anyway. The fact that she had was just a testament to the athleticism and strength she had underneath all that complaining.
     “Close. Maybe fifty rungs. Hang on for another five minutes and we can sit down and rest.” Yet again she was right. My hands and forearms were burning like crazy. I had long ago learned that climbing with gloves on a slick painted surface was asking for trouble, so today we had no protection from the narrow rungs pressing into our skin.
     For the next fifty rungs, the only sound I could hear above my heavy breathing was the clink and snap as each clip was removed and replaced. It was surprisingly calm this evening, the sun not quite finished slipping below the horizon. It was late August, so the temperature was still somewhere in the 70s this time of day. The backpack on my back seemed to get heavier and heavier the higher we went. I could feel the straps digging into my shoulders and trying to tip me over backwards. This bag was far too big for what I was doing, but I needed some way to bring a sleeping bag and blanket up. Finally, my hand left the last rung and found the top of the steel platform. I unclipped from the last rung and snapped on to the hand rail that went around the outside edge before I reached down to take Jamie’s hand.
     “Thank you sir,” she said, “I see chivalry is not dead.” Her hand brushed a few loose strands of long blonde hair out of her face as she stood upright next to me, looking out over the edge.
     “Ok, you were right. This is worth it.” She said in a matter of fact tone. I laughed softly.
     “This isn’t actually what we came for,” I said with a grin, “We aren’t done climbing yet. I just didn’t think you would actually come if I told you how far we were going. But the view is really nice here.”
     “You can’t be serious. I didn’t see anything going up any further.” She sounded rather incredulous.
     “We have to follow this platform around to the other side. There is a set of stairs going up to the very top. At least it isn’t another ladder.” I tried to sound confident, like it had already been decided that we would go on, but I couldn’t stop a tiny bit of a pleading tone from leaking in. I knew there was a small chance that she would want to stop here, but I also knew that going just a bit further would be completely worth it. I had scoped this tower out from the ground several times, using my trusty binoculars that I bargained for at a neighbor’s yard sale. When I discovered the stairs going up past the platform, I used an online satellite map to take a peek at the very top of the tower. From what I had been able to tell, at the very top there was a completely level platform, twelve to fifteen feet in diameter, with a secure looking rail around it. Amazing what a person can find online.
     My hope was to spend the night on that platform, hence the sleeping bag and blanket in my massive backpack. Tonight was supposed to be the brightest and most active meteor shower of the year in North America and the weather had decided to be kind to us star gazers, leaving a clear and cloudless sky for the evening. It would be perfect. Perfect if Jamie would go along with it, that is.
     “You are the worst kind of person,” she said. She wasn’t facing me so I couldn’t really tell how she felt about it. Finally she turned around and rolled her eyes. “Ohhhkaaaay. Let’s go. We’ve already gone this far.” She was used to situations like this. I was the one who always wanted to push the limits, go a little further, risk just a bit more, and she was the one who always asked me to reconsider and then went along with it anyway. I always felt bad for a little while, but I got over it pretty quick. It’s not like she didn’t know me well.
     “You are the best kind of person,” I said with a wink and a grin, “But let’s rest for a bit. My arms are tired now.” We sat down and I took off my backpack, setting it on the platform beside me, digging through a side pocket. I pulled out two bottles of water and a box of Poptarts.
     “Poptart?” I offered, “Snack of champions. All the professional water tower climbers eat them I heard.”
     “How are you not fat,” she replied, taking a delicious cherry snack from the silver wrapper. It wasn’t a question really, it was more a running joke between her and I about how much I should actually weigh. She’d usually joke that one day all the junk I eat would hit me at once and I would wake up weighing 400 pounds. Even though she joked, she wasn’t beyond being bitter about my eating habits since she worked hard to keep a perfect physique.
     Next I pulled out two plain white pieces of paper and handed one to her. I began folding mine delicately into the perfect paper airplane, using the flat section of the water tower for some of the more delicate creases.
     “I don’t know why I hang out with you. You are literally so freaking weird. Like who the hell would bring paper up the side of a water tower just to make a paper airplane.” She laughed even as she criticized. I knew she didn’t really mind. She had on multiple occasions told me that my “quirkiness” as she put it definitely made me more interesting to be around. I guess I was a little odd, but I didn’t really think that was a bad thing. I did what I thought to be amusing or entertaining. It wasn’t my fault the rest of the world didn’t seem to feel quite the same way about life.
     “In fifty years don’t you want to be able to set your grandchild on your lap and tell them all about the time you tossed a paper airplane off the side of a water tower? Grandkids don’t want to hear boring stories. I would know. I was a grandkid once.” Jamie just shook her head with a grin and started folding her airplane. Mine was finished and ready to be launched into the great unknown.
     “This is Air Farce One to ground station Loser, requesting permission to take off.” I did my best Top Gun impression, trying to remember how cool Tom Cruise sounded when he said it.
     “This is ground station Awesome to Air Farce One. Ground station Loser could not be located but we can go ahead and give you permission to launch. Have a nice flight.” Jamie still had at least a little bit of a child left in her. I tossed my paper airplane over the side, watching it glide several hundred yards before landing in the low branches of a tree. Mission complete.
     “What perfect throwing form you have,” Jamie said sarcastically, "You were probably one of those nerds who just made paper airplanes in class all day as a kid." Ouch. Yea, that had been me. Jamie wound up and threw her airplane with all her strength. She had made more of a dart than a glider and it flew fast, eventually landing in a tree considerably further than mine had.
     “You win this round,” I said with mock disgust, only barely able to hide a smile, “Let’s keep going.” I removed my clips from the rail and began walking along the platform. The bulb at the top of the tower was much bigger than it looked from the ground. I could just imagine the thousands of gallons of water above and beside me.
     Eventually we reached the stairs. It was nice of the designers to have taken pity on the poor inspectors who had to climb this far up. A ladder going around the outside of the bulb would have been terrifying. The stairs curling around the side felt much more secure. Reaching the top, there was a narrow platform leading from the edge of the bulb where the stairs ended to the flat space in the center of the tower. There was only a handrail on the left side so Jamie and I were sure to snap our harnesses on. The sun had almost fully set by now, the last tendrils of light just enough to see by as we made our way to the center.
     “Okay this is cool. You know what we should have done? We totally should have brought an air mattress up here and slept or something,” Jamie thought aloud. “I’ll bet the stars look amazing from here. Oh and look you can already see the city lights over there!” I loved seeing her excited. She would take one hand and play with her hair while the other would point at things. It was kind of weird when I thought about it, how she always pointed at things when she was excited. But that was just Jamie being Jamie.
     “You read my mind.” I pulled the sleeping bag and blanket out of the backpack and laid them on the flat steel. I probably should have realized how cold that steel was going to be. Oh well.
     “We are so in sync right now,” Jamie laughed. “This is awesome. You were right.”
     “Wait so what did you think was in the bag?” I asked. She hadn’t mentioned it before and I never said anything about it.
     “Honestly I thought it was a parachute or some **** and you were going to try jumping off the edge,” she laughed, “I would have tried to stop you but I decided I really won’t feel guilty when you die doing something stupid.”
     “Brilliant!” I exclaimed, “I am so going to try that next time!” I wouldn’t really. I liked doing risky things, but I wasn’t suicidal. We spent the next few minutes getting the sleeping bag and blanket situated. I loved the fact that Jamie could be spontaneous sometimes and that she was totally okay with just camping out on top of a random water tower on a Wednesday night. How many people in the world would have been okay with that? I was lucky to have her as a friend.
     We had everything settled by the time darkness fell completely. The climbing harnesses had been stuffed into the backpack and the backpack had been strapped to the railing on the side of the platform. With the sleeping bag laid completely open, there was still at least five or six feet of open platform on all sides of us. It felt secure enough.
     “I also forgot to mention that tonight is a huge meteor shower.” Jamie and I were on our backs, looking up at the infinite blackness.
     “I love shooting stars.” She said softly. Her eyes were wide and I could see her making fake mustaches out of her hair. She had kicked off her shoes and socks and was wiggling her toes in the night air. There was only a sliver of moon, just bright enough that I could see the glow of it on her cheeks.
     “It makes me feel small,” Jamie whispered, “I feel like that should bother me, feeling small, but it doesn’t. It’s weird because it’s almost comforting to me. Here I am, this tiny speck of dust, floating around on a larger speck of dust in the middle of infinity.” She wasn’t usually one to enjoy philosophy, but on the rare occasions she spoke like that, her point of view and opinions usually inspired me. She had a beautiful mind. She just didn’t often care to open up and share it like this.
“It makes me feel like it can’t all be an accident. Some people say that we got here through a series of random and fortunate events, that there is no great plan or design. But I just don’t see how that can be. How can mere chance create something like this? Of all the possibilities, of the infinite infinite possibilities, I just can’t believe that people, that you and I or anyone else were put here by accident. I don’t think that life could be an accident.” She spoke softly the whole time. Her voice never raised or quickened. Words seemed to flow forth effortlessly, as if this all were prepared and practiced. She was able to speak without doubt or hesitation, with such certainty that even the greatest cynic might have stopped to listen.
     She continued on, weaving words as though spells, playing ideas as though harp strings. She talked about her life, telling me things she never had before, teaching me things even I didn’t know. Jamie didn’t seem to be Jamie for the next while. Instead, she seemed to have become a font of wisdom, ideas, and genius. At least, that is how I saw her. She was able to take a single idea, and examine it from all perspectives. It was as though she held it in her palm, slowly rotating it to peer closer. She made connections that I had never thought of, inspiring me to think even deeper, loving the moment. All the while she lay there, watching the stars, wiggling her toes, and making pretend mustaches out of that long blonde hair. Eventually, she turned silent.
     “But what if it is an accident?” I said. My voice was unusually soft. “What if it was all an accident? What if there is no plan, no fate, and no reason for anything? What if there is no beginning or end and we are just insignificant bits of space dust? The idea of it not being an accident just seems so conveniently comforting, almost too convenient.” Jamie was silent after I finished. My heart was beating fast and my mind was alive. I didn’t feel close to being tired.
     “So what if it is,” she said eventually, “What difference does it make? Even if it is all an accident. Even if there is no meaning to life at all, it seems like a beautiful accident to me. Here we are, you and I, able to share this with each other. That seems like a beautiful accident to me. Here is this great big world, all the adventure, all the excitement, and all the love that it is filled with. That seems like a beautiful accident to me. Here is this infinitely huge sky, filled with stars that are incomprehensibly far away. If this is all an accident, it is the most beautiful I can imagine.” She paused for a while longer. “I feel that whatever you believe, it doesn’t really matter. Perhaps you believe there is a supreme design and plan, or maybe you believe that life is an accident filled with chaos. It doesn’t matter. We all live in the same world. We all see the same beautiful sights, we are surrounded by it. It is only our perception of it that differs. I choose to believe that such an incredibly beautiful world cannot be an accident.”
     I was quiet for a long time. Jamie had, for all intents and purposes, rocked my world. Hers was a perspective I had never thought of before. I, who believed I had thought it through from every angle. I, who believed myself smarter than the world. I realized then, at that moment, laying on the top of a water tower in late August watching a meteor shower, that maybe I was not a genius. Maybe I did not have the world figured out like I had believed. Maybe, just maybe, I was just a cynic; a cynic blinded by the misfortunes I had seen and suffered; a cynic disappointed in a world that had not treated me well.
     Jamie took my hand in hers, interlocking her slender fingers within my larger ones. She turned her head to the side and looked at me, still sporting a fake mustache. The sliver of moon was reflected in her eyes just so that I could not really look into them. Her lips were curled into just the slightes

the stars, quite literally,
aligned for the sweet & sour
meddling of the human race.
an artistic, feuding mortality now born,
thanks to the haphazard and
wildly unlikely mix of
tingling elements.
humans, we are in a
tiny sliver of time.
the stars, oh wow, they gave us
our legs and quickly enough
an unearthly load of growing pains.
a prophecy, a gift, a humble endowment
of neuroplasticity.
the tiniest sliver of time, where the stars
aligned, for the tiniest burst of
clumsy, hopeful light.
in these star-kissed structures we grow,
fail, fail more and fail again until
finally we decide which failure defines
our livelihood– a raw and honorable
pursuit which is not our ultimate
footprint. the starts, they know,
they die.
we must live our lives knowing
that we are in a sliver of time.

Sliver of silver moonlight beams.
From the other side of the  window gleams.
Shines so bright in this dark lit room.
But I cant get out of this awful gloom.
Heart aches and I feel it cracking.
But I cant think of reasons for it to be happening.
I hate myself and I'm so ******* sad.
I'm no good at anything and it makes me mad.
I cant make music, I'm an awful writer.
I have no degree so I'm impossible to hire.
I grew up never knowing what to do.
With no interests, talents, or will to give clue.
I'm stuck as an adult with what feels like no future.
I'm stuck in my head and I feel like a loser.
I don't know anything and I hate myself.
Wish there was a way to escape this hell.

tonight the shadows ate the moon
i sat there in awe as it was slowly consumed
little by little the brightness was devoured
and behind the shadows, the moon never cowered
the blood moon shined
as the sun and moon aligned
and the moonlight becomes you
you too are consumed
eyes bright and full of wonder
the cold wind makes you shudder
make a wish as the last sliver disappears .
let the music of the night fill your ears

I could tell you,
But you’d laugh at me.
Because it is bare, raw and pure.
You gloat on the preservatives.
You discard the genuine.
Listen to me, my friend, there is a part of the world, where even a bulb is never, ever, witnessed in real, but reel of the sanskrit Cartoon slots. The peppy  and ‘lone B-grade Cartoons .
Filled with Flesh.
The stories of tantric mantras, with a sliver of diminishing hearth,
on the
Dimensions and depth of the Yoni in the resin of shellac
on the Immaculate ceremony,
In a woodpecker hole just underneath the sealed power of the Yakshini who truly screws it up if you have taste of her once.
the one who harbingers drunk loners of Kavadiyattom alley after 3:20 am.
She takes them to the crown chakra of palm trees.
Shows them the world.
she pushes them off the crown and the falcon falls in endless spirals of a inhuman push that pushes the concrete innards to a danlgling mass of amoebic copulation.
Breath comes back.
It is a big nauseating gag of Kumbhakarnan's long sadya that lasted for half a decade.
Of the soma saras that made the entire India go, ga-ga and believe they've seen the god.
But not one nor any saw the same face, colour, shape or even vibe of the god they had seen alone.
They agreed in unison that all their hallucinations of beautiful humans in Flower UFO s and high-tech cloning, were a vital hair in the nostril of the cosmos.
They made, each a god out of their genuine mix of memories.
Or in the, priest's ways,
Hence, the 2.3 Billion populous of the country had the same, well, odd Spiritual benefactors.

Keeping it all aside, lemme be honest, I'd follow many a fairy god-mother but give my milkey teeny tooth to the special one.
Hinduism tells you God is omnipresent.
Hinduism tells you God is within you.
It also says, there is no God.
The clipper to snap off the confusion of this, lies in the same cheap stained-yellow cliche of love. It entails everything. You, me, animals, plants, cosmos, vibes, thoughts, dreams and the universe.
It tells you to live with your body mind and soul.
From Kamasutras that teaches sense.
The excitement, control and breakthrough of it.
Like tao did under his exposed roof without the sacred dung of from Hindu Land.
This is the secret of a rumoured Mohini,
Of her 1000 per hour ******* during the her/ his/ its 352 incarnations.
which was the reason for Big bang.  
Amidst the sultry scant of the voluptuous *******,
Their skin,
a vernacular reflection of a dusk on the Japanese gold beaches, And the mounts,
firm and glowing with the rusty shade of pharaoh’s Gold anklet.
The gooey glaze of yesterday’s glamour in the wink of a gay galore.
Paulo Ceolho’s Holy Communion with God,
Or like the Japanese Tengaman says,
Or rather screams,
That all it it takes is a little *******.
So, yes.
That precise art of attaining a consciousness, from where your mind was
Afloat
Wild
Free
Satiated
By yourself
You’ve just consumed the essence of you
Your Ojhas
And the tiny matter that teaches the universe
Of a Shunya.
That, momentary sense of lapse of your body mass,
Or the breakthrough into your eye of the crown.
Only to join the mundane bustle of the 10,00 speakers on all four
JBLs, Boses and Pioneers live looping the zillions of sanskrit mantras under one roof.
In your Ear drum.
A synechdoche of the Gods and their jacuzzi of amphetamine bubbles.
Splashed from a white Elephant's bejewelled Snout, which has the
crowned ring in your pineals.
Secret lies under
the rotten bone chip of Hussain Sagar
deep under the ***** green lake,  
drowning the rainbow Buddha in the city of slimy immortal maggots on ham.
Open your eyes.
For the Gods will
Else
Cut your eyelids off
to show you that
the city's shardminds await you.
roaring
Playing close to the fire demons of Redland
A nail close to your wide open lid-less
White flowing eye.
Hear the city scream.
The deafening chaos,
In unison,
Intoxicating their venomous fruits
of the delirious worlds
Or simply put, divine prayer and offering
for
the Omnipotent,
Omniscient
And the
Om.
Shunya.
Or the cyclic abyss of meaninglessness.
But,
Like, the wilted azures
that seduced those flies,
From a far far away,
To come the praise the combs of their bellies,
Filled with the red from the omnipotent, dead, weak and evil
In one little fly belly.
They came from the
land called Lullaby.
To go there
from here,
But, first,
bear the Weasleys' infamous extendable ears and heed me now, for I say twice and See him Come.
The snake, the tangy smell of goated black rub and blueness.
Siva shouldn't come?
Not yet. A little DMT more in the brain and perhaps the spark will happen.
Better than the potions of those gigantic forest priests.
No, Heed me, now.

3 Dodos Walk-afar,
And, take the lone left-laden log
the one that is,
limitless Long
loyal and  let alone
By those
languors which
Killed
Lord Leopard Loot'.
While,
Lord's Lass
Lays lolled lambs,
Lolled ‘long le ******,
Leech on the laiden log,
leading to Lord Lava,
Yes.
The bridge of Casilii Po.

Of the Lord.
Guarded
By these bubbling bellies with a drop of the world's make.
Assassins.
the Fly, flies.

retain the scarification of theolden curse,
Older than the rocks underneath this gurgling lava,
On which reincarnation steams.

As destiny should have it,
the astrologers had seen,
3 centuries back
That at a Sphinx’s Wedding,
a war of Vision,
will break.
It will
Bring the Stars
Out of those melting blue nightsky of Neruda's wails;
And the diabolic estrangement inflicting Eagle,
From Meena’s vibes,
that rubbed of a distinct scent of Malabar embedding a little of everybody in the village,
on its Kasavu lines posing
at the focus
of Sahib's Ferguson or Baker.

The gold turned white.
A liquid white, like that of the sap,
For that,
***** on a parrot green rubber plant
And work your fun with the white gluey milk,
fragrant than the sap
Like the  Ylang Ylang buds freshly kissed by the drooly dew,
sealed away
elegantly in a crystal Indigo bottle by the pen stand.

One that glitters if you look at its surface, but smells of naphthalene ***** in the sink
in
that
creepy trailer in
mid salem night of the tut.
Colourful.
This is colorblind.

White is motile.
White is wriggling.
White is life.
With a **** of Eve’s fabric-less
Skin.
White is divinity
feeding you excess of everything,
With an tenfold over dosage injected intravenous, by a silver-haired-glow-in-the-dark-dodo-cupid;

She is divine.
**** Her.
**** her on a Pyre.
**** her innards on a fire.
inflame the bubble
of her her oily effluent you found on the toilet seat
Instil in her, the seed of your sodomic occult,
Not by compassion, but through a hiss and sting
of the
flawless venom of the diabolic.  
Then. Disinfect your fruit that you flicked off the paradise.
And bellow to the blowing gurgling below.  
A reign of ****  nihilism,
moaning the mood-swings-of-a-98-year-old-menopausing-Bhairavi of the Indian Aghora Tales;
And Shelly, fueled in his undiminished hearth with the help of his impetous West Wind,
dreaming lucid,
on a flight in the sky for one week,
with Lucy’s sewing  sequined buttocks,
Stinging their luminescent, lactating, lustrous skin,
Like a tatto machine, lifting rays into the epidermis
So that it roasts, burns a soot and neonifies the only colour
A shade of
The rave, rainbow-red karmas of human existence,
Its little greedy quantas waltzing around the matter
And of its unleashed illuminations
That fuel the same vessel in the universe,
infamously known as,
the
black hole.
Uggh!!

Someone tell that little sliver she's worth being a part of.

Someone find her validation--
A gentle giant with a tender touch.

But please don't mention how I called her,
Or she might shy away
Please just love her good and proper,
She isn't here to stay

Now, I know it don't sit too pretty
Peering from the city heights
But somewhere nested there, my sliver
Sings and sings and sings despite
The noise from every animal
That ***** and eats and ***** and sleeps
My sliver that was worth it all
My sliver who was thin and deep

Elated to see you aloft in the night sky
To what do I owe this enchanted boon.
In the merry company of winking stars,
Enthralled by this sight as I admire my moon.

Bathe me in your streaks of translucent silver.
Accompany me through my sleepless nights.
Watching over me with unwavering vigil.
Swathe me in whispers of peaceful respite.

Oh how you govern the raging tides of my soul.
Rest your gaze as the waters break upon my shore...
Erode and weaken the load strewn over my burning shoals,
Sands drowned breathless but craving for more.

Few nights now... Smitten as you coyly turn away.
Thick strands of shadow clad hair in gentle cascades,
Alluringly obscuring a slight fraction of your face.
A tiny crescent blanketed away; into the blackness it fades.

More nights pass... Now I see only a lesser moon
Leaving me with only half; darkness so had claimed.
Please make yourself last; you mustn't leave too soon,
I'm not ready to be left crippled and maimed.

I silently look up as more nights go by.
I watched my lunar love dissolving into space.
My heart too, torn away a morsel at a time...
Finally she had gone; without a sliver or a trace.

Every nightfall since is rife with emptiness and despair.
I asked the stars if they could soothe my gaping void...
But they'd only twinkle in indifference...
Regardless of the pleas I've employed.

Unsure of how many rises it has thus been.
Nights only brought the onslaught of mocking stars above.
Still I toy with the promises made overhead,
For the awaited return of my crazed elusive love.

I know it's frivolous to think I'm the only one...
There are others who pine just as I do.
But I yearn the most for your sought after attention,
For our hearts have sung in every colour and every hue.

Anxiety at peak, dismayed almost broken,
Then I hear a sweet song sung; distant and far.
A song that shared the words we once had spoken,
Again enveloped in translucent silver, with relief I sighed...,
                          "There you are..."

.

Eyes sliver open languidly, feel out the corners
Stretched, palms pressed against white walls
Pull the covers high above my head
Building courage to greet the day

Lungs fill with a familiar scent
Smile, reach and caress a glowing cheek
Next to me, he turns, all elbows and sighs
Find him  in a second with tingling toes and fingertips

Untangle the limbs and sheets
Firm and nut-brown, coarse in the right places
Soft in the best places, he's flawless
Dare to disturb the rhythmic breathing


Wake up, I whisper
Coffee, he groans

a princess sits in her royal lounge
troubled at mind, restless of heart
trembling limbs and parched tongue
the rivers in her eyes betray
the sorrow that drowns her soul
with shaking fingers she struggles
for a firm grip on her quill
her heart pours out in fluid words
to express a love nursed for years

“My Lord, from childhood I have heard
of your courageous acts and kind character
of your handsomeness and perfectness
and I am unable to draw my mind away
from thoughts of you and yours
I am shamelessly besotted by you
Like a sunflower that is drawn to the sun
I am drawn to you
It is against the common notion
for a woman to ask a man
to take her hand in marriage
I break every tradition,
but Mukunda, answer my question-
which woman, high-born
and well-versed in all the arts,
will not wish to be your consort-
and besides I have already considered myself
wedded to you, in thought and spirit
is it not immoral then
when I consider myself a married woman
and when I am already yours
body, mind and soul,
to allow me another marriage?
My brother Rukmi has arranged
a marriage for me, and it is in the morrow
my heart sinks in sorrow
you are my saviour-
it behooves you to come
and claim what is yours
and how to accomplish it without needless bloodshed
need not cause you worry, for I have a plan
tomorrow morning I shall go for my pre-nuptial prayer
at the temple in the outskirts
away from curious eyes
and it is from there
that you can take me
please do come Krishna and save me
from this mockery of a marriage
I have already said that I am yours
and if you do not come, I shall
with no second thought ensure
that I am no longer alive
to be the object of another man’s desire
and if not in this birth, we shall
in another birth be man and wife”

she seals the letter with  burning tears
and entrusts in a priest’s willing hands to deliver
this receptacle of her hopes and fears
a sliver of hope begins to glimmer
as exhaustion finally takes over
and sleep beckons with gentle hands
to distant happier lands

In the morning she awakes
mind no more clouded or deluded
a faith unshaken that strengthens
as her messenger arrives
bearing happy news
her heart gladdens

Krishna will come – of that she is sure
a love denied will now be hers
the blush of excitement gives way
to shyness - kept so far at bay
the letter was written boldly enough
but now her maiden coyness asserts its sway
with eager pulsing heart she awaits
the moment of freedom and fastening
with her love – it seems too long a day!

In her best finery she is bedecked
a bride blossoming like a flower
eyes shining like diamonds
in their excitement
nocturnal hair that falls to her waist
in a tidy plait
lips tinged with a secret smile
an accompaniment to her glowing face
her blush spreads
like a rose amongst jasmines

with slow sure steps
and comely gait
eyes glistening with hope
and conviction strengthened with faith
she proceeds towards the temple
with sincere emotion she prays

“Devi Parvati, with your motherly grace
look upon me with your kind gaze
as once through penance you gained
your true love as a husband
I too embark today
on a quest to find my way
to him who is my very soul- I pray
let Krishna me my husband”

As every minute passes hope grows
and then she hears his majestic roar
like  a dark thunder-cloud he appears
his turmeric vestment blowing in the wind
and like lighting in the night sky
suddenly and nimbly he hoists her
onto his chariot and they are away

and then the powerful anticipation of this moment gave way
to its pure enjoyment, the company of the loved one

and thus it was that the unflinching Rukmini
wedded Krishna one day.

- Vijayalakshmi Harish
        10.9.2012

Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish

Her mouth glittered agape
With sacred promise,
Like a box of unused
Engagement invites
Christening invites
Birthday invites
Still in the wrapper
For sale at a
Lifeline.

When you’d rather live
In a car
Than the zombie stance
Of a modern house,
Clean and soulless
With a hermetically sealed lawn,
Winter pageantry draws to a close
With bogan’s shooting-
Pearly eyed paupers
With constellations in their gaze.
With eyes full of hope and stars
That burnt bright and fade for
Flickering lens light.

Their voices murmur soft
Through catacomb
And underbrush
As only the ephemeral things are whispered of –
Dreams.
The addicts of ideals
The junkies of hope
The drinkers of despair
Have tiger soft tongues.

They lap and feast gladly,
From broken vessels
Chipped with hazardous teeth
That seek to fill their
Ermine mouths with the ******
Draught
Of truth.
Stumbling through wine-hour
They swarm, with tongues ******
And all constellations burnt out.

The hyacinth rides wild
Upon her shoulder,
Writhes in the silver brunt
Of moonlight,
Writhes in the stillness of dead perfume.

Marching to the beat
Of my enemies drum,
My hands inside my pockets.

Little bluebirds spun from dream
Sit on the holy perch,
A branch in all innocent minds.

The redeemed and patient
Make a subtle art from
Long distance perversions.

Similarly as we chase ghosts over Daffodils.

Fields of winter
under lunar glow
sway without us.

Long distance love
lingers with loose lust
along Regret street.

I hung it next to the memory
Of childhood cooking and Indian summers
Without further thought.

It slipped into the novel that took the form
Of an old coat, slipping into the lined pocket
It sank with a sigh.
Satisfied with itself.

Bombarded by the pounding
Dead eyed stare of ***** goddesses,
Broken by the undisputed angelic
And unglued ones,
All moon faced
All hopelessly optimistic
All lawfully rebellious
With green serenity
We pasted our dreams
On a wall so real it shone gossamer.
He counted the imperfections in the glass
With mind hesitation
As the whole world went black,
In a sea of much deserved discontent,
Wishing for the soft.

A moment of pure luck?
Jesus was an astronaut
Smoking Zen by the fire.

Suicidal angst
never had you in sonnets?
What a ******' shame.

Our life is but a song
We never hear.

I chipped away at the excesses
of my baroque person,
each strike took a
Railing
mounting
wall
decoration
desire
demand
exclamation
from the battlements.
All left now, a hill.

I paid for my banquet
with a sip of loneliness
and left behind the question
that asked all quiet poets
the meaning of love,
that asked all quiet poets
to answer with a villanelle
shouted from every
distant peak.

They sent the troopers
to greet me instead,
and my library was put in shackles,
and I kissed their ***** feet.

I answered that I carved this mountain
from the baroque bedrock
upon which they laid their city.
They smiled and asked about the aqueducts.
I wept and spoke of kitchenettes.

A meal provided
on a lead cast plate
my jailor asked about freedom
I answered with defeat.

There were two atoms
One questioned the meaning of existence
The other the existence of meaning.
             -Regardless they looked the same.

An apple on a branch,I took
The same way history takes a footnote.

The same way cashiers are all doctorates.
The same way trains find the station.
The same way you sing like a bird (and I like a cow).
The same way we never really wish to be writers.
The same way our final friend is made of pine.
The same way all streets lead to nowhere.
The same way all jobs **** society.
The same way we always lie to our children.
The same way a man loves a woman.
The opposite way we ****.
The opposite way we make love.
The way that I know a man who’s totem animal is a worker ant and he is unemployed by choice.
The same way we take old memories and turn them into fashion.
The very same way all sacred things become profane and all profanity becomes sacred in the eyes of many.

Dying relic of the Optimistic Seventies,
A new coat of paint for the old irony
     -slap dashed with obscurity.
Although I wear the costume of my enemy,
I will write the exaltation in blue smoke
As **** by an unsuspecting victim
Occurs in the dark.

The face of another love stares down at me.
I smile.
Yet I know it is not her.
I weep.
A sudden method sparks revival.

Jackie Pleasure wore a gray smile,
The anthem of a lost generation:
‘Happiness is lost in smiling.’

You are dead to me,
the boatman calls
I will not taste of your amber lips
I will not taste.

The welfare of all never hinged on darkness as we fear the fall,
A multitude of angels sang their songs
And never learnt to say goodbye
Or cast a long distance eye
Over half spent desire.

Drawn out caricatures,
Paraded intoxication
Flirt with our mistress death
And have her pick up the tab.
She pays with silent music.

The ***, we learn, is a bridge
Between all words and waltz’s,
Our Light Brigade to conquer art.

In the twilight of this, our mansioned night
Let us ring out true with indulgence,
Excess, abandon and the call of ‘yes’
Kali rang on the wire of a golden telephone.
Her name
“Kali, Kali…”
Like a quarrelsome minotaur
Flew through the waves of silk ideal
And strangled the babe
With cool breath.

There was ice (oh yes!) and fire and song.
With our candles burnt down to the ash of all streets
We walk then. We walk.
All life is but a song.

The ghosts of all forgotten stamps
Now echo on the wind of speech.
On High! Oh speak!
Of songs sung but never danced
With our broken dream.
When starlight meets the dust, and
Shadow eats the snow,
All our stories are satin sheer
And all our wants are gone.
We watch the memories march, until
They find a sliver of chrome that showed that place
Where all piano’s live and breathe.
My father in the wishing well,
My mother played trapeze.
My sister never saw the light,
My brother never born.
That was that,
Where stars meet dust
And floorboards sing off key.

What is the meaning of Life?

Does that not state there is in fact a meaning to our lives? Are we not conceived with a blank slate and let our actions be guided by the environment we have become accustomed to or is there a true predestined meaning to our lives? Is it neither?  We are nothing more than what we are and nothing less than what we are not.

What is my purpose?

Purposelessness.

What is God?

God is what leads me in the direction that I am heading and keeps me away from where I have not gone. God is not in the endless skies watching my every action. God does not know me. I don’t know God. God is not a being. God is not energy. God is not matter; God is not made of protons, neutrons, electrons or photons. God exists. We made God exist. We also made God disappear.
What is reality?

The tangible and physical perceptions that we have keep in our memories. As soon as we forget, reality disintegrates. When we remember, reality regenerates. Reality is not constant.

Why am I here?

Spontaneity

How did I get here?

I managed to avoid every other place than where I am. If I averted where I am now I would be someplace else. I would be any place else. Am I happy? Yes. Am I upset? Yes. This experience is beautiful yet full of dismay and I experience comfort but sorrow for only being able to experience a small sliver of the universe. But this is my sliver of the universe. I love this sliver of the universe and I would fight to the death to save this tiny space for anybody else to experience existence the way I do.

Who and What am I?

I am human, **** sapient, ****, hominine, hominid, primate, Mammalia, Chordate, and Animal. I am an Earthling from the Milky Way. I am what I am labeled, by others and by myself. I am defined by everything I am not and I change every day. I am not constant.

What will happen when I die?

Transcendence from existence; Appearance into eternal rest. My body will provide nutrients to the world, my memories will be lost. I will no longer be, except in the minds of those who knew me and in the evidence I leave behind. I’ll be lost forever, the evidence will soon disappear. I will be over, the universe will go on. That’s all I could ever ask for.

A sliver of light for all the times that trouble turned your world
A sliver of light through mist that left your whole story untold
A sliver of light means illumination, even frail, and pale, and otherwise weak
And any friends you've lost may come again
And if you let the loss break you, you'll find it much worse
You'll find it much, much worse
Hold strong and find solace in distraction
I know you're lost and pained -- we're both pained
If it's an advocate you need, I'll speak
If it's a guard you want -- or need -- I'll be your sentinel
A sliver of light for you in doom so as to see beyond the strife
The struggle is lost in faith of better company
We explorers, we regard the grace in open arms
Quite highly

Oh sunset, your aura still lingers,
A charming shade across the sky,
A perfect watercolor painting,
The first sign of day waving goodbye.

Oh sunset, you're so beautiful,
Your colors paint the air,
Flashes of the brightest hues,
You leave traces everywhere.

Oh sunset, how you grin,
With such a cheerful light,
Your lovely warmth is always,
An unexpected delight.

Oh sunset how you have lit my path,
Tolerated my blurry tears,
You're a familiar place, where I've loved and lost,
But still you remain, despite the cruel years.

Oh sunset, now you're dancing,
Alive, and carelessly free,
Sunset im feeling jealous,
Oh I wish that could be me.

Oh sunset, how fleeting, mysterious,
You never do stay for long,
Just enough moments to make me realize,
What in my life is so very wrong.

Oh sunset I despise your tricks,
The way you flirt with the sky,
I am not as easily deceived,
I see right through your lie.

Oh sunset i see youre wilting,
but please don't go just yet,
I need your flimsy arms to hold me,
and im scared i will forget.

Oh sunset, you fade, silent as always,
A trickle of fear touches my heart,
A sliver of doubt is all that I need,
To tear this beauty apart.

Oh sunset, you smile, wink, just play,
Deciding it's time to make haste,
So gone is the promise of comfort and love,
All hopes, all dreams; a silly waste.

The treetops aloft are golden,
but shadows are closing in,
Oh sunset i would love you more,
If you werent so weak, such a coward, a fool,
To  let the darkness win.

I never saw a man who looked
with such a wistful eye
upon that little tent of blue
which prisoners called the sky,
and at every drifting cloud that went
with sails of sliver by.

I walked, with other souls in pain,
within another ring,
and was wondering if the man had done
a great or a little thing,
when a voice behind me said,
"The man's got to swing"

For he did not wear scarlet
nor did he speak of it,
for blood and wine were red
and so was the color on his bed.

He looked upon the garish day
with such a wistful eye;
the man had killed the thing he loved,
and so he had to die.

There are so many places and spaces for truth to be found all around in any particular way so never stop looking for what you may not know is there waiting to discover the honesty of that moment in a sliver of time which will make an elegant memory painted as a picture just in mind for this rainy Winter day.

Oh how i yern for a classy girl like the one in my dream
The type you see on  the silver screen
Romantically spoken
Unraveling her ****** being without showing anything
God was I born in the wrong era
To have a beauty around my arms worth the sincere charms
Would be my moment of triumph
Taking her on a moonlignt drive listening to some jazz
Or a lovely candle lit dinner with roses to make her blush
Oh what a rush it would be to find my dream girl from the sliver screen

angry men who do not know I do not have a dollar or a cig to spare. Ugly irrefutable contagion-handed howlers. Angry mischievous heathens that pantomime on 6:00a.m. sidewalk, Wicker Park gallow stop-sign, choreographed gutter-punk drunk walk. And of all he wants and could ever want splits down his gooey membrane brain in the outline of a noun shaped fragment of a clause, "Couldja spare 80¢ for the train," but of course I don't spare on the ellipsis or the period. Semi-colons I won't! My rubber-bottomed leather boots lash out, heavy scraping sounds trail this mirrored shadow half an angle behind me.

*****!! Blonde framed sunglasses from American Apparel, a gift from my sister in a folded Ray-Ban case is scattered on last nights bedroom floor, my girlfriend has certainly not noticed, the gloom-coated morning sun spray has not noticed; but I have unzipped a fissure in the ocular lens. My heart skips a beat. Her bedroom might as well have swallowed them whole. Now the house can halt and have the shade, swaying in Spring air in 10:22a.m. shadows. The aviator himself Howard Hughes would strike me with his 488 aircraft. Edwin Starr in his invincible sinister calypso of War would turn me round. I was sturdy as a rock until I began to forget my forgottens. These unknown unknowns I knew I needed. I'm over a quarter-century on to noon going nowhere- and quite blindly.

But then, still she could stand upright and find me. Her neck crooked, looking onward through the East, the gristly roots of rhubarb buried in her searching fingernails. She's threaded worse, and of course if I could just tell her- this is the kind of nursing which requires acute temperament and flexibility. I am thus on a journey to strike nonsense and fear from the idiotic vocabulary that put this nonsense in my head. Split through me like a butter knife into my apotropaic. Perhaps tar water could cure my ails. If not, certainly a sliver of vanilla would set me straight. Or if could just rain rain rain all day, then I'd make do without, but she is at school. My pistons are racked and nervous, and I'm not going anywhere but my rucksack stoop. I am camped in midwestern Spring soup. Fog, rain, and shade. The nightmare of day.

It's by that sliver of light
which shivers and changes
that I know
you're there
in the room.

And I thought I recognized your face
in the sea of poems
but perhaps
I was wrong
'cos sometimes you liked it
dry.

Didn't you?

I'll keep looking for that sliver
in the door's side
knowing strangely
you will return.

I sneeze
again
in the wake of the dust
you've unsettled.

I asked you
If you thought
You were capable of hurting me
You said you weighed 115lb
But a sliver of glass
Cannot weigh more than a few grams
Look what that can do
You are a shattered pane
That is all I feel
Your little slivers under my skin
You are not my mother
But I hear her in your voice
You have a mother's touch
It stings all to familiar
You broke the skin on my face
Open like a ripe peach
I suppose we are all capable of terrible things
But you burdened yours as love
Pressed it into my skin
And let me rot in silence

POEM FOR IMALRIGHT
Dear Imalright
I discovered your poetry and LOVED all of it. I was struck by lots of what you wrote and it inspired to write this to you. I promise you I mean every word of it.
I read your poems:
Unexceptional
Unbeautiful
Anxiety at 3AM
Two sad teenagers
Relapse
Fifteen
Starving artist
2014
Nothing special
Rough Edges & a dorky face
Under eyes
I adored them and spent the better part of a full day, hours and hours combing through the verses, dissecting the poems, analyzing the words and fully appreciating your incredible work. I picked out my very favorite phrases or yours that I found particularly powerful and moving and responded to these lines. I wanted to start a challenge. (In fact I posted this challenge as a poem, you can find it on my page).
I thought it might be nice to do like a secret santa thingy on hellopoetry only not secret and not santa… what I mean is, find a random stranger you literally have never met and do NOT know at all whose poetry you like and spend actual time genuinely reading their work, picking out your favorite lines and responding to them, pondering them, etc. Write something positive to them and post it as a poem with their name in the title. The “DEAR BLANK” challenge only you put their name instead of “blank”. I think we could all use a little recognition that we exist and are worth something since everyone seems a little depressed on here (including myself) which is fine, it’s a great outlet but it would be nice for people to just spontaneously find that a random stranger spent time in their life just to recognize you and care about your poetry. To write a kind poem/letter to them responding to lines in their poetry. I just thought that you seemed like a wonderful poet and a wonderful person based on your poetry so I chose you, Imalright. So here it is:

Your head whispers these words that crawled onto the page:

We're the kind of people that fade into the background

that people forget are in the room.

-Imalright

I won’t say something that the rest of society seems to think fixes everything. I won’t tell you the typical: you are important to everyone, you are not just a faded part of the background, people do notice you etc. because those are empty words everyone uses and they people who are always pretty in the spotlight are always the ones to say it, so what do they really know about the background, forgotten, white-noise people like us?

I will tell you, instead, I know it hurts like hell to be forgotten. For your existence to go unnoticed. I know being a part of the background is never anyone’s first choice. I am a backdrop-dweller myself. I am the unnoticed girl who blends in with the shadows. There is nothing wrong with that.
Never forget that the starry night sky is a background too. You can still be wonderful without being the center of attention. You can still be wonderful even if you are a part of the background. I want you to know, I noticed your poetry. I noticed you, and your name, and your wonderful talent and I have spent my time dissection every poem you have posted because every single one of them, is a different shade of amazing. We are all backgrounds in someways but what we choose as our phone screen backgrounds tend to be pictures of what we love the best. Pictures of beautiful things. There is nothing unbeautiful about the background. So from one forgotten soul in a room to another, I your poetry was just another account in millions like the stars but you are one of the loveliest sections of this world’s background I have ever seen. Keep that in mind. 







I just wish that I was one of those beautiful things.

-Imalright

Once again, I won’t use a society phrase like: Everyone is special and beautiful in their own ways!! Because people don’t seem to get that no matter what they say, it doesn’t even matter if it is true, but if you tell someone who thinks they are not one of those beautiful things that they are beautiful They. Do. Not. Believe. You. It just doesn’t matter, it won’t change their mind, it doesn’t help and it doesn’t fix it. It just makes them feel like you are lying to them and then they feel vain and self-conscious about admitting to you that they don’t feel beautiful etc. etc. I’ve been there so I know.
So I won’t tell you that. But I will tell you a couple facts instead.

It is a fact, that there is ugly inside of every single person.
It is also a fact, that there is beauty inside every single person.
Because beauty is NOT a definable concept. It is different to every person depending what kind of lens they look through and let me tell you, physical beauty is artificial and even though I wish I could be physically attractive in my own eyes, I have come to accept and I hope you have too or will as well, that a deeper beauty than that is inner beauty. What you keep in the cracks and crevices you made yourself in your soul. I think you are beautiful. I the pages you’ve written on soaked with ink made out of your inner self is magnificent. Your way with words and your flow of thoughts, the way you look at life through an indigo-tinted-one-way-glass-lens, it is all a whispering sort of beauty. Like the soft ringing sound of raindrops skimming the window pane on a grey sky, storm cloudy day. That same sort of delicate loveliness. I think you are a very unique and exquisite color of beautiful unlike any other poet I’ve ever seen. I don’t know you, you don’t know me, we can’t label ourselves friends since I have never spoken to you, but friends are basically socially required to tell you that you are beautiful whereas strangers are bound by no such obligation, yet still I tell you, I find you a person with a beautiful soul. I have only ever seen your poetry, but that is enough for me to know you are a beautiful person. After all, poetry is really where our souls spill what they are truly composed of. If I were to judge your beauty by your face and actions, all those are altered by circumstances beyond our control, society standards and pressure etc. What you do does not define you. Your soul does, however. You are beautiful to me. 







I JUST WANT TO BE LOVED I JUST WANTS THINGS TO BE OKAY

-Imalright
A truthful scream of the heart that many have felt. It’s funny that we all have this same base desire that tends to reveal itself more and more the later at night it gets, and yet we all still suffer the feeling of being unloved and unokay alone and silently. I wish I could reach out and fix you because the pain of others that is out of my reach always pains me more than any kind of physical agony I could ever endure. I can’t fix you though, so instead I offer you the only thing I can, I am with you. As a friend, just another soul on the earth who has felt this feeling you express in this line. I reach out with the hands of my spirit and for your spirit. Maybe if you know that I too have felt unloved and unokay you can find comfort and strength in that. Because no matter what kind of darkness you face, literal or internal, I find being united with someone empathetic to you who knows how you feel makes it just a little less scary even if it is just a sliver of hope for even just a second. It is something and the idea of “hereness’ you know, like being “here” for you, being “with” you in that emotion is all I can offer and I just want you to know, I love everyone and everything until I am given a good reason not to. So in a way, even if not on a personal level (because I do not know you, so I can’t love you on a personal level the way a sister loves a sister or a best friend loves a best friend) just generally, you are loved by me, because I love your poetry and I love all things that haven’t given me reason not to. And do you know what? Even though it hurts and it is unfair, everyone has to be unokay for a little while. I have been too. Maybe you were unokay for longer than what could possibly be near just or humane or reasonable but you were strong enough to pull through. I applaud you for this and want you to know your strength in powering through your unokayness has been recognized and admired. By me. Because the warriors are the ones up at 3AM having anxiety attacks but never let it show and you are a warrior. I am proud to call you a fellow poet.




but being sad and lonely is worse than being sad.

-Imalright
I know what you mean by this line. It is sculpted so beautifully though. The words in the phrase are just so raw and honest. Not over romanticized, just plain relatable great poetry in its true form as it should be. Wonderful. I hope you have found refuge from loneliness or will find refuge from it soon in finding someone else’s heart to call your own and in your heart belonging to someone else.





A new scar for that comment that boy said.
A new scar for that friend that betrayed you.
A new scar for every word you swallow.

-Imalright
That boy has scars of his own and he thought it would make them fade if he cause you to have scars too. ***** him. The betrayal of a friend is a special kind of pain like being stabbed with a knife you made yourself. A pain I know too well and wish no one else knew. Let the scars heal and do not swallow words. You will choke pretty soon if you don’t. Keep in mind that you are worth more than scars. I think you are worth more than scars.






You don't know how bad things are.

-Imalright
First off, I love this line. Just so simple and yet so relatable. There is some beauty to that. Sort of like thorns on a rose stem. Although they can be piercing and ugly there is magnificence that goes along with it. To be 15 and not know how bad things are, you have the rest of your life to obsess over the bad things and how awful things really are. You have the rest of your earthly existence to be broken, so like a child’s smile, at least you had that one moment in your life when things weren’t shattered as far as you knew.





With nowhere to go but everywhere
-Imalright
What an extraordinary thought. Such a liberating idea. You have really inspired me with this one single phrase. Keep in mind, you can be so inspiring to people who don’t even know you (like me) just with your words. You really make such a difference in this world. I have decided after reading this line, I’m going to try and let a little bit of that philosophy into my life. Nowhere to go but anywhere.

And that hope is going to make me stop doing this to myself.

-Imalright
Well, I really hope so too. I hoped for hope to save me for way too long. Eventually you gotta find it in yourself because this world is a little short on Hope, its main export being Despair. Just know you are not alone in this. I wish Hope was something you could wrap and mail it to someone who needs it but I can’t hand you Hope. I cannot offer it to you physically but if it helps at all, if it creates Hope for you, I want you to know that I personally, desperately from the bottom of my heart hope to God, genuinely thinking of you individually as a person that you have healed or are healing or will heal through Hope. If that helps. I have been crumbling, but somehow, after a hell of a lot of anguish, I found Hope. You can too. If it doesn’t help then I offer you my hand spiritually and metaphorically. Stay hopeful, because in this world, that is all we have.






i'm nothing special
im not beautiful
i'm not gifted

-Imalright
I know I can’t change your mind the same way no one can change mine when it comes to how self-image and esteem, but I just wanted to tell you even if you don’t believe me, in my eyes and in my opinion, not saying this to be fake or just being nice. If it weren’t true I just wouldn’t bring it up or say anything about it but you are VERY special. …okay that doesn’t sound good that sounds like the kind of special people put in quotations like: oh, she’s um… you know, “special” alright…
What I meant was, you are special because your poetry has made a difference in my life. You insightful view into life, your precious unprecedented perspective on the world and how you perceive it is very special. I have already explained why I think you are beautiful internally and keep in mind there is no such thing as one type of physical beauty. It is all about opinion and to some person or some people out there, you ARE physically perfect. To them, your physical traits are their definition of beauty because beauty doesn’t have a size, a color or a shape. That is the beautiful thing about beauty. And you are gifted at poetry, that’s for **** sure. Your poems are absolutely toxically flawless I adore them and I really, really mean that. Your writing is close to my heart. That may come across rather creepy sorry about that haha :P but you need to know that you are gifted when it comes to beautiful words.






No one will make me believe that all of my flaws aren't wonderful.

-Imalright
Such a sensational thought and resolve. I really and truly admire and acknowledge your indescribable strength I wish I could achieve to not only accept but embrace your flaws. You are such a strong person and I want to thank you for being such an inspiration to me and the rest of the world, doing that and finding that truth within yourself that flaws are wonderful things.
wondering why i had shattered myself in the process of picking up someone else's pieces

-Imalright

Okay, before I say anything else… omfg wow holy mother of waffles. (That is not a very common expression but I am so struck by the priceless incredibleness of this line I can’t think straight. Also, waffles are good.) This is amazing… how do you come up with stuff like this???!! The imagery, the metaphor, the power of the phrase embedded in the words just… wow. Spectacular. God, I just really, REALLY hope with every ounce of my soul you find a way to repair yourself or someone to repair you because to lose yourself, saving someone else who was broken is so heroically tragic it breaks my heart because you are such a beautiful person.




Dear Imalright
I offer you Poet’s Love.
One poet to another.
I admire your work and your work is made out of little parts of you.
I admire you and your strength, your writing abilities and your outlook on life.
Never ever change.
I hope you find Hope.
Message me anytime should you need anything.
And I want to thank you for being such a strong inspiration to the race of people we call: Poets.
Love,
Ember Evanescent.

I bite down on a sliver of silver
That connects your lip to outer space
I cleanse the stars of all diseases
But find my heart cannot keep pace

I bite down on a sliver of turquoise
A talisman fit for an everyman king
But like the rings around Saturn
Escape velocity is hindered upon your string
                                                          ­                     
Poach me of my skin
And coat me instead with rust
I awake to a lute playing out of tune
Causing my dormant senses to all combust

Teach me to be a vulture
To sink my talons far beyond the surface
So many sharp facets, so many blunt edges
And my one and only distorted purpose

Darting in and out of atmosphere
A slave to bloodstained convictions
You own all the lands between life and death
And all the roads between fact and fiction

Why people feel the need or desire to
Listen to the radio
Or surround themselves with machines that whir and beep
Or white noise to fall asleep
Or go to concerts
Is beyond me
I don't understand why
People want noise all the time
They're committing a terrible crime!
They mutilate silence
Tarnish delicate laconism
And mangle quiet
Machines everywhere!
Machines and devices, noise and distraction from the essence of life
Tooting, blaring, screeching, whistling, crashing
Honking, booming cracking, grinding, and trilling!
We happily bask in this cacophony

So much noise that we tend to forget that
How truly precious real silence is-
A gold nugget in a long, tumultuous river.
Yet we don't want any of it, not even a sliver
Silence is that which comes nearest to expressing the ineffable
It's so pure and so true, so delectable
Silence is a true friend who never betrays
Whatever has happened to saying it all with a simple gaze?
Words are by no means proof of wisdom
Silence isn't ignorance or dullness of mind
Silence is refined
Silence is
A pause between birdsongs
The mournful song of lonely hearts
The sigh of a tree
The shift of the clouds
The obscure and perishing rhythm of forgotten thoughts
The throb of the summer sun
The timid streaming of tears down a child's cheek
The fall of a snowflake
The pulse of the veins on a frail white wrist
And a kiss between whispered promises

Babble is empty
And words, like wire
May seem solid
Yet they can be twisted to resemble anything-
Weak promises, false prayers, delusive prophecies
And can easily be broken, if one distorts them enough.

Silence is more eloquent than phrases
It is not nothing
It has a form, dimension, substance
A texture and quality of its own
So many people associate it with mystery, privacy and isolation
When really it reveals it all
Silence can be jealous; rough and small
It can be peaceful; blue and hazy
It can be tumultuous; confused and crazy
Silence can be loving; soft and surrounding
Or it can be spiteful; violent and pounding
Silence can chaste; reserved and shy
Or it can sensual, with a voluptuous sigh
Silence can be puzzled; blurry and nauseous
It can be disgusted; halting and cautious
Silence can be grieving; a falling apart
It can be horribly heavy; the weighing of unspoken secrets on a fragile heart
Silence can be anything
Agitated, insecure, submissive or authoritative
Giddy or gloomy, vicious or respectful
Silence contains it all
Every word, every language,
All the knowledge, all the memories, all the emotions
If you've ever watched a sunrise, or been in love, or spent a night home alone, or sat in grieving silence as someone held your hand
Then you know this

The silly young, the brash and impatient ones, always break the silence
With gossip and music and profanity and small talk
They always giggle, interrupt, argue and squawk
Constant conversations, words, motions, defense, offense, back and forth
Yet those who are comfortable with each other can sit without speaking
Because to love and be quiet is enough
To hold hands and not say a word is enough
Silence is the gift of the world that we've pushed aside
A precious gift wrapped in white that we've rudely denied
Silence is the highest form of thought
And it is by slowly developing this mute contemplation in us that we will,
Step by step,
With reflections, speculations, and musing
Be able to reach what is true about ourselves.
When we are quiet and timid
We sit silently and watch the world around us
We see things, we read things, we hear things that others don't, we keep quiet about them, and we understand.

I don't understand why people fear the hush
Perhaps people are afraid to surrender to the clear ****** of it
Maybe all these fools think that to keep quiet is to erase yourself
Maybe they associate silence with loss of life
Perhaps some of them know that listening to the silence can be painful
That it can reveal the pain of the world
So they cower and shy away from it

Yet look at what I've done
I'm just like the rest of them, aren't I?
I wrote and wrote, yet what do all these words mean?
How pretentious of me to think I could be one to put silence into words

i’ll waste all my chances at heaven darling — i’ll waste all my chances for the midnights we spent dreaming, stranded inside an old lighthouse as the waves crashed on the shore. i’ll waste my chances for a mouthful kisses, dissolving the gaps between the stars. i’ll waste my chances for a sliver of early morning poems, for sunsets dripping on our skin, for seconds where i can hold your hand — free and unafraid, for minutes where i can be a sinner and you, my capital sin. for hours where i can melt all the world and its hurtful words inside your arms.

darling, i’ll waste all my chances at heaven if i can’t love you way past its walls.

i’ll waste all my chances at heaven — and i’ll waste them all on you.

A sliver of gold can can make a heart turn to rust
A soul into dust

It can stop another dead in their tracks
Frozen in its cracks

Such a small thing she turned in her hand
A life in a band

Hot furious water, wild dangerous seas
Golden wheat fields, lazy bees

Dazed, tired, lost and yet found
Free at last yet utterly bound

in time's unblemished flesh
this silver sliver of bliss
played delicate vibrations
over my sanity
nuzzling my conscience
with it's tempting
calm
cool
violet kisssssssss

reposed in shade
'neath quavering branches
in lucid confusion
they sing the sighing song
of winds splendorous caress

we don't speak
our silence says enough
besides
our oral instruments
were occupied with each others tongues

This was written free-hand; excuse my grammar if it may sound weird but I felt it might be wrong to change it too much since the following is how it flowed inside my head:

Everything is predominantly dark: brown, black, blue, and a sliver of gold paint the scene afore my eyes. An elderly man sits atop a rocking chair. Below the inch of illuminated dust, I see an array of stratified wrinkles... they cover the cheek I once knew to be always a warm, pastel pink...they trace a lip I once knew to be long and quivering, coupled with an anticipating, yet welcoming happy gaze. The endearing purity - that childlike exhilaration and consequent sparkle-- it was a wonder to see that never left his eyes... The wrinkles around them now mimicked those that used to decorate his face when he laughed out of sheer excitement. I remember that in those moments of laughter he’d be able to embody that one noun in a wholesome glory, seemingly no other feelings lending themselves to the elation. I had never encountered anyone else with the ability to do that -- it is one of my only favorite expressions I have found deeply ingrained somewhere within the sand of my mind. It used to remind me of the free spirit I recall to have had as a child... and he coupled it- in what seemed to me a mirror-like manner.
His freedom was a breath of fresh air -- it swept me off my feet and I couldn’t help but breathe it and continue to breathe it..to crave it. I held onto it like it was the last piece of toffee chocolate I would ever eat in my lifetime... But no -- his face was now at peace. It made for an interesting paradox - made evident only to those who’d remembered the appearances of his expressions. His calm was contagious. I felt my heart give a familiar beat: two fast, one slow...that was the rhythm I had met 70 years ago.
His hair had now receded; it was as white as shadowed porcelain. He looked like his father, who I remember held that same potential for his son’s smile. Suddenly, his face turned towards me, quitting its reverie. He held a quizzical expression on his face and although he did not yet move from his seat, I knew that he soon realized who I was...He studied me just the same, drinking in all the information he could possibly gather, still taken aback. I cautiously came closer...three inches away, I knelt before him.
To look at him now felt like an ethereal experience. I momentarily lifted my hand and let out a smile. It felt more of a sigh -- half from happiness, half from awe. Without further thought, I this time bravely lifted my left hand high and in answer to his waiting face, asked: “May I?” Upon a second’s ponder, he gave a slight, yet prominent nod of his head. I brought my hand closer, fifteen degrees from his line of sight, and placed it on his right cheek. To my dismay, he closed his eyes and let his head fall into it, my palm serving as a buttress to his cup. I let out a more excited smile and instantaneously felt trickles of salt fall down my weathered rosy cheeks. His response mirrored mine -- he smiled a full smile against my wrist...his eyes were now closed- elated, that he was. Upon opening his eyes, he anticipated what I might do next: I drew a circle with my eyes around his face, and without a moment’s worth of trepidation, uttered the phrase he once beckoned me before first touching his nose to mine. “May I kiss you?”, I asked. He smiled deeper this time, his wrinkles even more pronounced...It was perhaps to this day the most brilliant sight to ever present itself before me.
Without further adieu I touched my lips to his. It was as chaste, as lovely and full of promise as our first and last.
In the fierce hug we embraced ourselves with to follow, my head once more against his chest, my frame covered with the wonderful arms that I have missed so much, I felt our breaths dwindle away into the rest of forever.
...So I kept my promise: I found life in this man’s arms, and I died in his arms.

Three moments later and 68 years rewinded, I find myself wondering: Is this what our reunion will be like?