This person who cannot be distinguished in a crowd, they stand leaning over a railing, holding their head. Their gaze is vacant and dispassionate, but I can tell it has latched onto me.
The difference between seeing me or anything else is of no special significance to them. There’s nothing inside them for me to find, I discover no point of contact in their eyes with mine, yet anyhow, I feel compelled to confess, that still I find myself in a bind.
I should say now that I won’t be able to recount the moment to you with any pertinent level of detail, or truth that could do any real justice to the events, or situation.
Nothing’s wrong, there’s no real reason why I should want to forget. I just do, despite myself and what I want.
But I guess nothing’s right either, really. It’s just that I’ll forget a face just like that. And not just that: I lose sight and see things. I’m confounded, I take things the wrong way, I’m wrong. I grope in noonday as in the night. Yes, this I know.
And so, if I take it to be true that you can only love what you can’t figure out, then, for me, maybe in reverse this could also be true.
Sure, I’ll be in love, why not? I’ll always have been in love. I’ll forever have been full of love, then.
Isn’t thinking learning all over again how to see?
This person I’m in love with, they stand leaning over a railing, holding their head. Their gaze is dull, but piercing all the same. I’m caught on their leash wherever I may turn. I feel it burn, even on my back, and there’s no hope in me for shaking it.
This person I fear.
I’ve never felt that words ever failed me. That would be too easy, I feel. It’s not the words, but me. Words too big, too daunting, I don’t dare face. So I look for something else, something to stand in for the words I can’t bring myself to say. And by the end, maybe in some way, I’ll have done enough, but I won’t have done my best. Not really, I don’t think.
And the thought of being released makes me afraid, too. Afraid of what I’ll do, it’s dizzying. I’m afraid, I’m afraid, I’m afraid, I’m afraid.
It’s at this point I’ve become estranged from my form. I make forecasts like the weather, or otherwise gamble, but about battles between drives inside myself as if they were somebody else’s. Forever my finger to the wind, looking for tells, yet for all that, I can never really say.
And this person remains.