Stuck in my brain’s electricalgelatin, under the weight of whatI’ve carried all these years, I rememberan oak scratching not far from the windowof a lingering thought:
the branches pirouette like a marionettewho can’t stop dancing a balletit knows by heart, maybea diva has memorizedher aria, the opera is about sellingblunders and loss. Once, I had a friendwho died
having an affair—a lovershot himself in the chest—three times.It could have been an overdose, of alcohol or meth,it could have been a car crash,a million wrong turns.
The opus of a short life endingin the calm of a lover’s arms.
There—stuck in my neural netthe drama has no answers for howturritopsis dohrnii can live forever, or whya fleeting glimpse of us remainson a breezy afternoon as if we had beenthose lovers sauntering aloneon Okunoshima, the island east of Hiroshima,the one that holds a history of warcrimes and mustard gas,
luckyto have its beach unscathedby bleeding blindness,lucky to be alive
strolling among the throngsof large-eared rabbits who hop in front of uslively as Ebizo Xi dancingthe paths of hanamachi.
Photo by Bruno Kelzer on Unsplash