Prose
Window
Autumn
Late Autumn into early Winter is a season of its own.
The air should always be cold, but the sunlight should always have that perfect refractive quality that it gets sometimes.
Air like that tells you there'll be exactly an inch of snow the next morning,
that will melt nearly away by midday,
and be a crunchy frost by sunset.
Perfection.
The Breeze
I was going to go to bed, but I didn't.
A humid, chilly breeze just drifted in from the window behind me, that we keep open for a nightly battle against that stuffy air of the day -- you know the kind, that too-warm, recycled-feeling air that makes sleep impossible.
When I felt the breeze, I squeaked the computer chair around to see a the beautiful pre-dawn sky; it's mostly midnight blue (a beautifully ironic phrase ... I have yet to see a blue midnight), with electric, pale-blue highlights lining every crease of the abundant clouds. Further to the East, the clouds grow thinner and fade to a smooth gray that somehow manages to be beautiful in its uniformity, an impression of brushed steel.
The silver maples in the yard are shaking in the wind, as if they're shivering from their few hours' exposure to that special summer-nights' brand of cold -- a cold notable only by virtue of its contrast against the cruel, dry heat of the day. The trees' dance is accompanied by a gentle chime from the gate in the chain-link fence at the end of the grounds.
As I hear the gentle whistle of a train from the far side of town, I notice the small black kitten that lives across the walkway ... he's perched, like a protective miniature gargoyle, on the roof of his home, watching what's left of the moon sink into the Western horizon.
Is it any wonder I'm nocturnal?
I Don't Know How To Love Him
Colorado's White Christmas
Irrational charity lurks in the streets, splashing even the coldest hearts with compassion. God's gift of snow, friendly gifts of shovels, a stranger's ride here or a free bus ride there; this time of year, humanity finds its center again.
It's Christmas Eve already, but that's not the first thing on my mind as I dance to the mailbox, happiness conducted through me from the snow on my bare feet.
A day passes, and I've spent time in the company of friends, celebrating the Savior's birth. I rejoice not only for its miraculous quality, or for salvation, but because His existence proved the human potential for selfless love.
Love is the only theory that doesn't change in practice, and I'm lucky enough to live that fact. On my way home, I miss the last connecting bus in the thriving area of downtown Denver, where the homeless mingle with the classy, and everyone is humbled by the season's arts and the beautiful decorations. Why would I want to go home, anyway?
I'd given away my big leather jacket earlier in the evening, to a man just out of jail (after all, he needed it). I didn't regret it for a moment.
A kindly-looking gentleman, visibly a good person in a rough place, strolling by the bus stop, is clearly frozen and hungry. To what better use could I have put the leftover chocolates from the party? What's more, down the block, he gave the remainders to a homeless man. My beliefs, regarding the good in the human soul, are reinforced; "pay it forward" doesn't need to be spoken to be understood.
Single-serving friend three strolls along, stranded one city away from his daughter's home. He's comparatively normal; not a drunken college kid or chess-loving homeless man. Six bucks short of a bus ticket to warmth and Christmas cheer, he offered to give me his phone number so he could pay me back. For the third time that evening, I stated the obvious -- "Hey, it's Christmas!"
The lights shine on the outdoor mall as I wander the street, trying to keep my feet warm. Five-foot drifts pile on either side of the daytime shuttle's path, and to get to the benches in the median island, I discovered the unwitting charity of some well-measured gentleman who had left deep, clear, large footprints in which I could follow. Kindness isn't always deliberate or conscious.
Later, after two invisible chess games against myself, and half a movie in my head, and a new song about Christmas scrawled on notebook paper in my pocket, the bus station opens. Never have I been so grateful for warmth, or so relieved at the mere thought of it! It's amazing how humans can be grateful when they have an excuse to be miserable.
I don't bother with sleep, choosing instead to keep my plans for the day. In the evening, wandering home after enjoying the company of a friend, I finally slip and stumble in the snow for the first time since this blizzard began days ago -- in the pristine, two-foot blanket on my front lawn.
Lying there for a moment, wondering if I'm going to regret the snow seeping into my ill-chosen clothing, I consider choosing to be unhappy.
Instead, I get a mad case of the giggles, make a lovely snow angel, and proceed to irritate the cat by shaking off a lovely coating of snow in the living room. I've never felt so alive as that, wrestling time to keep cold slush from running down my back, with the warm glow in my vision that a sleepless night casts. Years after the fact, nobody remembers "Mmm, I remember, that was a really nice warm bed I slept in all those nights." We remember the friends we meet and the choices we make, imprinted in our minds by the intensity of the experience.
I'm only one person in this vast city, and I feel humbled and average in an odd way; there's something about being part of humanity that tells me, logically, many other people had a lovely day, too.
What a wonderful Christmas!
Virulent Sensationalism
It's peculiar.
A gap in memory
is only so frightening
when told in third-person.
How dare the media mislead.
She can't recall yesterday.
How dare my mind
sabotage itself,
without my consent?
Faces seem twisted and strange.
There were no consequences
until I was aware of the problem.
What solution can there be
when the cause is blank?
Two solid weeks
of nothingness,
eleven years ago.
But she always wakes up ...
They said maybe I wouldn't want to remember,
that I should trust my subconscious
to take care of me.
It just got worse and worse.
... only to find she'd been miles away.
"I know the truth,
and it mocks me."
Losing time.
If I'd known earlier,
perhaps it would have been less frightening.
Sensationalism is unrelieved suspense; it often includes violence and may produce fear in the reader.
Readers often like it, as the popularity of horror books and films attest ...
How dare my mind
sabotage itself,
without my consent?
... but it is usually considered a sign of poor quality.
How dare recovery hurt.
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I like short pieces, direct and to the point, and they're even more intriguing when they have a poetic flow. It's a trick you've done - people always think poetry, literature in general, needs a to follow a list of demands: be intricite and require a boring sequence of analysis.
I like this piece.
I enjoyed this, it was unpretentious (something I often fail in being) and definitely gave me the sense of the night.
Constructive criticism... hmmm...
All I can think of is maybe you should mention the itchiness of the pillow and overall restlessness. Thats what I'm like when I can't sleep.
I wrote it from needing to express something, more than from wanting people to 'get' it. :P I'm glad you liked it, though.
FTR, most of the italics are from the Dream Theater song "Losing Time/Finale" from Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence. It's about trauma resulting in blackouts. The last few italic lines are from some page I found Googling when I was looking for a title, so I added the definition of 'sensationalism' to add a kind of morbid accent (with the 'poor quality' line).
