A pomegranate:
drawing near, eyes averted,
you said we could share.
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October: Free Writing #10
Look, it’s that time of the year again, and my eyes are watering day in and day out.
Smog. Smoke. (Dying) Sun.
It doesn’t matter. Let the tears fall freely; you can wear your masks and your jackets and use your purifiers and pretend they do something, but with every cig you light and ash, you give a little bit of yourself away. Well, give it all away. What for, or who for, or wherefore do you wait?
I know you’ve been trying, but I think you’ve been looking in the wrong place. I think you’ve been trying for all the wrong reasons too. And if I didn’t know you better, I would even say your attempts are, in general, futile. But I know you. I know you well. I know it doesn’t matter to you whether any of this actually works: it’s the semblance of sanity that you want. And that’s a good start I think. Because I want it too.
I have green tea and academic possibilities awaiting me at the other end of this screen. A smoggy room, stale bananas too. Remember this: as you read this, from wherever you are, I am writing this very same thing simultaneously somewhere, letting the words drip languidly in an attempt to clear my infected throat. I am writing to you, but for myself. I am writing so you might hear me. I am writing so that someone might hear me.
That someone is me. Do you see it now?
And this is no inspired measure of prose. I am the only one who can hear me. I wish it was less poetic, less motivational this truth. It is what it is. It is how it’s been and it is how it will be. I wonder what happens to a landline that goes dead. Do they keep the phone or do they incinerate it? Do they let the old machine sit around gathering dust or do they replace it with internet cables? I wonder what will happen to me when the line goes dead. Who will pay the bills to keep it going? Who will still use a phone? I don’t know.
I’m sure it doesn’t matter. You can see me now anyway, any time you please. My pictures are forever, and maybe my words too.
Look at them now before they perish.