a micro-second of time

the list blew away in the wind before the welcoming doors of the grocery...that crumpled paper blown across the berm…

the doors open to brown eyes. feminine. like looking into a cup of warm cocoa. a longing there. or maybe hurt. much as you desire to look away, you cannot, you must not. they do not stare, they pierce….and you must look, but your mind tells you to turn away…turn away. don’t get involved.

but it is…you feel it in your gut, the ache, the offense. the well. the tender-well. you touch more than a surface. you cannot look away, even if…but you do not want to. you see her…the tattered threads at the end of her left coat arm, the scraped lip, the eyes that open too wide but close to protect…because you are near her. she makes no move to look up. you can hear her breathing. you can feel her breath. like stale tuna. you want to look away. you want to escape, you want to find time again. where is time? it is nowhere. she is here and you cannot look away, because she is pleading. but the words are not words in her eyes. so you walk, and turn to look, but she is walking away.

….did i dream that...or did that just happen?

as night invites himself in, the lights dim, and you find yourself yawning in the mirror. you have bags under your eyes. my eyes. you notice the gray hair on your shoulder and wipe it off. time slows. you see beyond the mirror. you see the pools of her soul, then the figure walking away. you look deeply, like a full breath in and out. in the waking night. 

why can't i forget?

but as you lay down, curled up in blankets, all alone, you pray…because it is all you can do. somewhere in the distance, separated by space, not by time, is another figure awake in her bed…

in a microsecond of time.