Someone else

I took a long hard appraising look in the mirror. It’s not The Persistence of Memory I tell myself, but it’s different in a hundred tiny ways. Stray strands of white or god-help-me-grey snake through my hair. Fine lines and dark circles surround my eyes in an outline much less flattering than kohl. I am sure it’s me, but if I look away quickly enough it could be someone else.

A woman whose pinched expression cannot hide the dimples in her smile or the annoyance written across her brow.

If I squint I can almost see the person she set out to become. Satisfied. Impactful. Happy. I wonder what would make her laugh hard enough throw her head back and shed a joyful tear. I guess at what could give her pause, make her sit with a moment and let it grow. I theorize what might be her biggest regret. Wondering if she carries it on her sleeve or locked away in her heart.

I hope for that woman, the one who cannot be me.

I want her to know contentment and comfort… but she only smiles when someone is looking.

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December mornings

The trees stretched bony hands towards a sun that never quite delivered. While all around her was the death rattle of winter. It was a cold stark beauty she thought, almost like a slab of marble, hard but still compelling. It brought a slight glint to her eyes in the early morning hour.

Looking up through the branches to the sky she felt a closeness with the off putting weather. It made people turn up their collars and hurry away. She had that effect sometimes too. People often found themselves with other places to be when she was around. It was just as well. Bren liked the solitude that could be found outside. It seemed more honest to her.

Outside there was little distraction, if one could look past the societal fingerprints that seemed to stand out against every surface. However, Bren liked to think that she could shut out that nonsense. She would sit in a moment watching a bird or tracking a cloud and never once flush with embarrassment.

It was time to blink reality back into focus though. Time to zoom out so the interesting shape in front of her could become a thing with solid lines again. She tensed against the thoughts that came racing in. They streamed by in watercolor sadness and angry heavy modem art lines.

It was always easier to not think. To just exist and worry about the minutes as they came, but there was something about the stillness of December mornings. It seemed to demand introspection and deep thoughts. A shiver rain down her spine that was less to do with the wind than the thoughts whistling through her mind. Bren pushed her hands deeper into her pockets wishing for a way to not look as anxious as she felt.

She turned back to the window glowing softly with warm white twinkle lights. Her eyes closed as she took a steadying breath. Okay she told herself, and she hoped she was right.

Reality is never kind

Egg on my face again, and I would have guessed that by now I wouldn’t mind.

But when you believe in the lie you live reality is never kind.

Cut it clean or it’ll never mend, this isn’t a wound time can bind.

Swallow your tears then… happiness isn’t yours to find.

Junior’s Clan

We gathered last night, by firelight in a huddle of sorts, to steel our nerves. Three generations deep we sat and talked and laughed to hold back the dark. If only to remember that the whole remains even if it feels diminished. It was as if we wanted to cement the fact that standing together could represent standing for one another. In that moment there were no tears only strength.

My grandfather might be gone but these are my people.

He was a man. He had Alzheimer’s. He would not have remembered me, but I remember him. To me he was the most imposing man in my childhood, stern but with eyes that could smile when he laughed, and COVID took him.

My you find your way to the tree of knowledge on your way to what comes next.

I watched…

I watched his mind shatter.

A thousand sharp and unforgiving shards, that cut and tore as they fell, surrounding him. There is no graceful exit. His tender feet, frozen with indecision and fear, cannot bare the weight.

Is he slipping or have I lost him? Either way I’m a captive audience. The active yet unwilling participant in a game of chess I didn’t start. I might not see the checkmate coming but I can feel it.

The pain reads across his face, a map to an empty future filled with anxious worry. A distorted image of twisted tension locked in place. I build my effigy in granite, praying I do not crack, sliding the emotion from my heart just in case he looks.

It’s my job to assemble the broken pieces but the image isn’t right. A fuzzy picture smudged with blood and streaked with tears. I squint and strain to bring reality back into focus for us both, but mostly just for him.

With foundation rotted and supports unhinged I’m still building our house of cards. I’ve lost track of the white rabbit but I’m pretty sure the time is late. The pills haven’t done anything at all, and he can’t or won’t sleep easily tonight.

It’s shallow water, and I’m drowning, not that that will slow me down. Holding on is all that’s left. So I cling to his shattered being even though it’s gotten hard. Mind of glass or filled with sand, either one could slip through my tenuous grasp.

But I’m still here, watching him, as time runs out.

Caught

The loop was endless perfection, no beginning, no end. It just was. No one questioned it anymore. No one kept count of the days, weeks, or years just the minutes. Just the long seemingly endless seconds.

Those we kept.

While it was pointless that everyone still had a clock even if they didn’t have a calendar. It was interesting to think back to the moment when the days, already so blurred and hazy, went away. But moments were all that was left. Of course we all remembered the scourge and the riots. The starting point, however, had faded into the loop when it got worse not better.

What power lies in a date that doesn’t in a moment? When we lost the historians to current events no one even bothered asking that hard question. Who had the time? We were busy fighting for each moment holding on by our fingernails daring the sunrise to come.

And it isn’t over. And the rule of the loop is, it doesn’t end. But I’ve been keeping track and hoarding time.

The loop wasn’t movement, that was the lie, and it will work till someone looks up and rubs the blinders from their eyes. It only survives if we stop looking.

So now it’s time to put the x-ray specs on. To cut out the rot and flatten the curve.

Together we can break this wheel and finally feel the winds of progress upon our brow.

Rather, rather not

The truth is I would rather not.

I would rather not be the maid, the butler, and the bank.

I would rather not be the difference between swam or sank.

I would rather not be the cure if it means I must have been the cause.

I would rather not be the measure of motion against your pause.

I would rather shine without worry of your tarnish.

I would rather act with impunity and without carnage.

I would rather be who I am without censor.

I would rather live my life without wanting more.

So the lie is I alway will.

Scream #2 Art Print by andreaslie

Nothing changes

His heart was racing and his face was flushed. He couldn’t remember everything he had said, just how close he had been to hitting her. She had walked away so awkwardly, an unnecessary stiffness in her posture that he didn’t understand. He hadn’t even touched her.

She stood under the deluge of hot water shedding silent ugly tears. Stupid cunt bitch. His words stuck to her in ways the soap couldn’t help. She squeezed her eyes shut remembering the moment his eyes had gone wide and his hand hovered an inch away. He hadn’t touched her though.

They pick up their conversation as if the last 30 minutes hasn’t happened. She asks if he needs anything and he mostly ignores her. Her voice is empty when she speaks, no emotion or opinion. His voice is steady, no guilty lit or sheepish remorse. No one apologizes or forgives. The I love yous before bed will not be punctuated with gentle kisses.

Everyone’s changed, but nothing changes.

I told you so

“You said one day one of us will resent the other… you were right.”

The words hit with a marksman’s skill. I waited for the honesty, but I waited in vain. An “I told you so” died on my tongue.

You just didn’t expect that it would be you.

Half-truths

There are days when everything exists behind rose colored glass, millions of moments strung together like sunlight. Those are the days that build sanity, but add links to the chains. The pops of color and flashes of light disorient and distract to perfection, creating Polaroid quality slices of life. The truth is stretched and twisted to make the filtered image that’s shared with the world. The reality is back breaking hard work and soul shattering compromise, but it is the half-truths which bind us.