cut away the form until the essence remains
unless you are an absence, in which case you can only be seen in the
frame which defines you, the walls cradling the empty space where you
sit and stare like a camera that doesn’t record, doesn’t send out a
signal, only pans slowly back and forth, a silent witness without memory
or judgment, before which my selfishness and loneliness looks entirely
unremarkable, similar in its every attribute to the thousands of other
people who pass by this same spot every single day, so that I almost
think to myself that by sharing these similarities that I am in fact not
alone, that I am a part of a thing beyond the end of my skin and breath
and sight, that there is a silver thread run through a small hole in my
forehead which stretches and knots among all the people around me, but a
web of loneliness cannot by definition nourish or warm, just confirm
what is obvious, and as I scurry away and try to think about trivia from
movies I saw as a child, or the lyrics to some half-dreamt pop song, or
some fuzzy future when I am with the person I’m secretly (not so
secretly) sweet on, or someone resembling her, or anyone at all, as I
panic-rush for a distraction I know I will not find soon enough, as
tonight in my bed just before I sleep all the things I saw in that
absence will be there, staring at me, waiting.
(12:12.05.19.2005) [/ana] #