a simpleton could see

Memories are the strangest things. They fade and disappear, they get repressed, they're obliterated by trauma; they are triggered by everything and nothing. You think you bury them and then you find them knocking on your door on the second wish of a monkey's paw.

Today's came packaged in brown-fuzzed kiwis. What a strange way to deliver them-- they really just look like hairy eggs, don't they?

I slice one kiwi in half and find a bit of winter, ensconced in the centre like a sudden sullen ice crystal. I slice through another and find a touch, fleeting as a breeze in mid-July. I slice through one more and there, nestled in the golden flesh, curled among the speckled seeds, I find your smile.

Each kiwi half is egg-cup-shaped, small bowls perfect for cradling in the hand. I remember what it felt like, silver spooning soft tart acridity in the middle of the snows, seated at my window or before my table. I think I remember what it felt like.

Everything you remember is nothing of the truth.

*

I can see you now, standing at the crossroads. I can see the cuts on the inside of your wrist, skin taut against the bone. I can see the blue rose tattoo snug against the overhang of your clavicle.

I can see the way your hair spreads out over the wood of the floor, the veil in your eyes when you look up at the ceiling. I can see the way you want to keep running. In your face I can see already the lines that will form, the lines that are forming, the lines that no one else will expect to be there because you smile so much that there isn't any reason for your countenance to be sadder and sadder each day.

Time passes and we learn to not talk to the moon. We learn to stop making eyelash wishes. Time passes and we learn some wishes never come true; time passes and we learn there's no one talking back.

I can see you now, standing at the crossroads. I can see your hair like fire in the sun.

*

(the week of 15th August)

This week I'm learning a lot of things.

I'm learning how entrenched the human brain can be.

I'm learning how easily the body forgets.

I'm learning how I've always thought you were perfect.

I'm learning how to face my fears-- yes, even the wince-worthy bits-- to seek a little more confidence.

I'm learning how the biggest of secrets are told in the smallest of moments.

I'm learning how there are things that still go unspoken.

I'm learning to be joyful.

I'm learning not to discount gestures-- because, as perfunctory and needlessly-for-show as they may be, sometimes somewhere to someone they can mean a lot. A gesture meant I forced myself to speak. A gesture meant two people not going to jail.

I'm learning to love the music that comes with the breaking of every link in the chain. And yet, for every groan of overstressed metal giving way, I hear a sinew snap.

But guess who's going to be stronger?

*

(Equus; or, the philosophy of pain)

"The word 'passion' is rooted in passio, Latin for suffering... Christ's suffering during his trial and crucifixion is known as The Passion."

Is passion always insanity? Must we bleed to know we're alive? Do we live only in pain?

I dismissed Strang as an overwrought glowering brooder (broody hen! I like my men-- possibly my women too-- dark and troubled, but certainly a little less transparent than that). But Dysart stung me, moved me, whether because of oversensitive self-identification or sheer circumstance-- he knew, whereas Strang was merely caught in the throes of his own mental labyrinth. He knew the way out, held the golden thread in his fingers; he knew also the feel of the pyrite gilt disintegrating between them, knew that outside for all his Icarus-charges there would be but the hot heat of the sun and the crushing enveloping waves. He knew, and he had to make a choice, and yet keep the slipping mask intact. What was he looking for but a bit of worship, a bit of meaning, an answer to why?

Why do we hold on to our passions? Why do we hold on to pain? I don't have an answer. I only know at times that I don't know whether my deathgrip is on meaning and sanity or on my own windpipe.



Cheryl tweeted, "Lecturer's question of the day-- are you living or merely existing?"
My follow-up question to that-- which I didn't ask-- "What are you living for?"