“Why is it so fleeting?” she asked from the edge.

I shrugged, but her back was to me, so I said, “We’re not meant to be trapped in happiness.” Head resting against rough bark, I closed my left eye, watching her through the right.

Her bare toes curled into the sand of the cliff, dipping under gnarled fingers of roots. “Trapped? What a sinister way to describe happiness.” She looked over her bare shoulder, “Pain isn’t fleeting. Are we meant to be trapped in pain?”

I switched eyes. The left eye caught the shimmer of the ocean past her silhouette. “Sharp pain is fleeting. It’s the dull pain that sticks around, and we endure. We’re adaptable creatures, us humans.” I plucked at the green poking through the grains of sand, now watching her with both eyes open.

“Well.” She pirouetted. “I think I am going to fall.” Facing me now, “But I’m scared. I know the fall will be exhilarating, but eventually I’m going to reach bottom.” Hands thrown out, hair caught by the ocean breeze, “And that’s going to hurt.”

I stood, pushing off from the tree, “Of course it’ll hurt.”

A grin, a step back, arms wavering for balance, “But you won’t stop me?”

I reached, fingers brushing her arm, “You never stopped me.” I looked over her shoulder at the blue, “Besides, it’s not the possible pain that makes the fall so frightening.” I smiled and met her eyes as she leaned into the breeze, “It’s not knowing how far you have to go..”

Time with her was like wrestling a polar bear.

The polar bear! The slightly-confused ursine cousin, the snow-kissed emblem of the unintentionally cute, the sharp-tooth predator quite capable of making a meal of lesser mammals.

I?

I am miracle fruit. Freeze-dried ice cream. An hibiscus amid champagne.

I am the tracks in the snow.

a fox ran for the hill
red-tailed, I followed
only to lose
her, at the edge of the wood.

she was too small and I
too much of a thing not meant
for small spaces.

so I let her go

I have a tangled, mangled, mouthful of words. They’re sharp enough to cut into my gums, long enough to gouge my cheeks. And the longer I hold them in, the more they pile up.

This last year has been interesting: I went hang-gliding at Kitty Hawk, chased crabs by flashlight on the beach, wrote (and acted in) a one-act play, taught a class, destroyed a car, bought a car, rode the Harry Potter ride at MGM (twice), walked with sharks and swam with dolphins in the Bahamas.

I attended the short film festival in DC, caught the Book of Mormon in New York, participated in Santarchy in Pittsburgh (as Hobo-Santa), and watched a woman strip while putting together Mouse Trap (burlesque rocks!).

Not to mention stopping by a sex positive convention, assisting at a naughty freak show by standing on the back of a woman laying face and chest-first in ground glass, taking private harmonica lessons, changing employers, sword-fighting in a parking lot, and hiking by moonlight.

And this Saturday I’ll be hosting my first murder mystery dinner at my house.

So – I’m still here.

Busy.

But here.

You are not lost amongst dark angels; the pillars of light you dance around are not meant to illuminate.

But burn.

We all have strings. From wrist to wrist, from throat to throat. Tying us to our secrets, our hungers, our friends, our family.

Yours are not mere strings; you have wrapped yourself in barbed wire.

“Why are you waiting for the thunderstorms?” she asked.

How could I not? I answered.

Because the moments before a thunderstorm are a precipice where the whole world holds its breath.

Because when it comes, it comes with a torrent of rain. It doesn’t tap at the windows, it knocks hard enough to make music.

Because the space between the lightning and thunder is where god would exist, and the thunder itself is the moment before fear, the moment of fear, and the moment after fear, all rolled into one glorious sound.

Because it is Noah’s flood. Because It is purifying and terrifying and beautiful in the way only terrible and great things can be.

Her bare feet rested atop the dashboard and she caught me glancing at her legs. She flashed a smile, and said, “So where are we going?”

“There’s a novelty museum up ahead. Pet rocks, pink flamingos, Mexican bouncing beans. Little robots that make tea.” I said.

She laughed, “There are not!”

“And a bit further beyond there is an old motel with those vibrating beds that cost a nickel to activate.”

She glanced at the car’s empty ashtray filled with coins, “Do we even have nickels?”

It was a good question. I grinned, shrugged, and focused on the road, which was lined with evenly spaced palm trees. Although there were no cars ahead of us, the trees brought the three-second rule to mind: pick a fixed object in the road; once the car in front of you passes it, count to three slowly. If you pass the fixed object before reaching three, you are following too close.

The rule is meant to keep you at a safe distance. To avoid collisions.

Abruptly, the neatly spaced palm trees on the left were broken up by a gas station sign. I glanced at the gas gauge – it was edging perilously close to the E. I pulled into the station and up to one of the pumps.

“Why don’t you grab us some snacks?” I asked, opening my door. She followed suit, hopping out of the car. She paused just long enough to look back at me with another smile before disappearing inside the station.

I studied the gas pump. Just how far could we go without any more gas? We certainly wouldn’t collide with anything if we weren’t moving.

Could we?

I counted to three slowly, replaced the gas hose without using it, and followed her inside.

almost. kissed
you made it seem like an inevitable
accident.
a trick on fate

almost. spoken
somewhere between magic
and stuttering photographs
trying so hard to create space
where it shouldn’t be.

almost. sweet
the way you read to sleep.
more real, I think
then anything else you’d said

almost. shared
a phrase or passage
for a moment
the best kind of neighbors

almost. enough

What happens when you stop feeding a wolf?

It gets more cunning, perversely more patient.

And hungrier.