with my own eyes.
it felt so good to laugh today, especially when there seemed to be nothing to laugh about. it took a while. we cried. we fucked. we divided property. and then we laughed. i wonder if this is how it’ll be until we don’t know each other any more. that wouldn’t be so bad at all. i felt release. the slight panic rising to my throat was probably just bile, but it was tempered easily enough by deep breathing and play abuse. i think i’m going to be okay. at the same time, i feel exposed, but awake, like i have been put on the front line of battle somewhere and ought to keep my wits about me. if there were ever a time to think clearly and keep it together it would be now. i’m aware. i see him again. i appreciate him again. too late, but not a bad way to end things at all.
this day doesn’t seem to have an end. a permanent overnight. even now, 3am, drunk with old love and lack of sleep, pills coursing through my veins, i thought they would coax, but they only numb and itch, like novocain to my soul. they make me thoughtful. they make me want to stroke her hair and allow her to hold me. but they do not make me want to close my eyes. the last time i closed my eyes, he belonged to me. if i ever fall asleep again, when i wake, it’ll be alone.
i’m scared, as scared as i’ve ever been. it’s strange, but i could equate this feeling to living in a foreign country. i don’t speak the language anymore. i don’t know anyone. i don’t have anywhere to go. i wasn’t born with a placement. i’m alone, but not just alone, i’m without josh. it’s like something is missing. he became this extension of myself: initially my eyes, my ears, my tongue, my fingertips. he was how i experienced newness, even in the old. the ordinary became constructive. he impressed me. he still impresses me.
towards the end, he was like a phantom limb. some piece of me had been hacked off my body, but my brain had failed to receive the memo, so it just went on all day long, thinking the limb in place and productive. but in reality i had lost a leg in dallas while dancing with that train. sometimes even ghost legs can resemble the real thing so fiercely that it’s hard to tell the difference. memories are tricky like that.
