saorsa
“We are two shipwrecked people lying on the same beach, in as much hurry or none as the one who knows he has eternity to look at himself.”
The Ache.
I have this fantasy of meeting someone who looks past my blue eyes into the archway of my soul. The door is high with a catenary arch, and I’ve hung my sleeping gown from one corner where the wood split. It needs to dry; I washed it, so it smells somewhat of soap. It’s tie-dye skirt patterned blue, purple, and white. I think of the girls whenever I wear it. My crew.
A friend recently approached me about how I refer to my female friends by gender. “It’s confusing,” she’d said, “are you polyamorous?” I didn’t answer.
If I were to name my posse, I’d give you a few names. Yes, they would be mostly women, if not all. My new bestie is Ampara Davila, a Mexican writer with a beat of dark humor in her fantastic fiction. I lay in bed with Davila, in that nightdress I mentioned, reading Musique Concrete and wondering about the toads in my life. It’s not a lovely story. Perhaps it's not even funny; I found it hilarious, though when I went to recant it to a friend, it simply sounded violent and horrible.
Sleep was frenetic for me that evening, and I kept choosing Davila over dreams. I rose with the sun, a sky blue as my pajamas, and stripped to do laundry. The bedding, towels, and a handful of garments were tossed into the washing machine. I waited on the terrace for the machine to do its work. My favorite moment of the day is listening to the audio messages sent by my friends. It’s nice to hear a voice, even through an electronic device pressed to my earlobe. I do this as the daylight breaks, the sun arching in the east corner where the yoga class takes place on another rooftop patio.
How many people truly hear what I have to share? It is one thing to listen; it is another to receive the other person and reciprocate from the heart. I can feel it, whether the person cares or not. It's taken me a little while to learn; I am often so excited and wrapped up in the transaction that I neglect discernment. Not anymore! Today I wrapped myself in the yak scarf I’ve toted across the world and rushed to the roof with an espresso and my heart full of hope! I sat in the wicker chair with the red cushions and closed my eyes, feeling the sun's warmth on my face and cool tiles against my toes.
Flicking through message after message, listening carefully and cautiously, what did I hear? Beyond the words of the beloved, what was lurking beneath the conscious surface layer of the message? Four kittens slept outside my apartment on the staircase with their noses pressed into each other's limbs. Seeking a corner to hold them, seeking an acute angle to snuggle themselves into. When one moves, the other three adjust themselves around the vacancy. One by one, they rise and shuffle down the staircase to seek water and food.
One by one, they return at the day's end, when the water sparkles gold and pink as the sun dips low in the west. They push their noses to a paw and sigh deeply into that spot amongst themselves that they call their home, for now.
Photo source.
