Low Love

Am I disappearing?

I feel like I've become invisible - particles of this body, that's become alien to me, dissipating, as if I were made of sand, and the tide is coming in. The edges of my life are softening, losing importance. I am here, yet I am not. I yearn to be fully present again, to know how much space I occupy, to know just how much further I can stretch the elastic band of my existence.

I want to make a humorless librarian laugh until she runs out of breath, until her glasses fall to the floor, breaking under our feet.

I want to climb a mountain, and meet a handsome hermit there, who'll roast wild turkeys with me, until we both fall asleep by the fire, exhausted from telling truths.

I want to kiss a stranger, surprising him to life.

I want to kneel in front of the Dalai Lama, to have him bless me, to hear him tell me that I matter, that if I did disappear, I shall be missed.

Do I really matter?

Would you miss me if I was gone?

The first night I dreamt of wolves.

They were chasing me through a wide, wide corn field, where the husks were glowing, neon pink phalluses lighting up the dull grey horizon, which was the same color of as E.'s best suit. As I ran, husks shook free from their stalks. When they touched the ground, their kernels blossomed into buttered buds - popcorn, yes, it was popcorn - and the wolves swallowed them whole. By the time they reached me, they were already full, they'd lost their desire to tear me apart. I, however, had not forgotten the agony they had put me through, so I took the empty husks and drove them into their skulls. There was little, if no, blood.

As the last one of them fell, I knew I was free.