A Universe Away

I am walking. From where or to where no longer clear, if it ever was, on this journey. To whom, however, still occupies my mind like a warm summer day, and soon enough I find that day has crystallized around me. It is still early though, an only slight crispness suggests warmth will come, once sun rises from the horizon. I hear the sea behind me, and a large ferris wheel, empty and motionless, looms large just ahead. I walk through the sand to the makeshift wooden staircase, leading to the quiet amusement park. Though my feet have left the sand behind, my soul feels as if I still plod through it, words added slowly and with great effort. I sift through for a poem that might bolster me and make swift my approach.

"At a distance called

From a universe away

I see you smiling

How does my path look

From your place, I hope of rest?

May it bring you joy

Purest intentions

Words repeated day by day

That nothing may shape

Truth of almond guard

This ear tuned keen for nonsense

In mistranslations

Clockwork since Babel

Who am I to disagree

With prize gleaming?

By agreement walked

With determination pushed

Under sun proven

Nothing new indeed

My brother closes loophole

Daughter draws me in

Our eyes shine the same

Crowd's disputes disregarded

Stride hastens to you."

I make my way through the turnstile barrier with a *click* that echos through the park. Something about this place feels emptier than I expected it to be, as if you are elsewhere somewhere within, rather than felt all around. Still, the tangibility of the realm is precise and crisp, so I inhale deeply just inside the park, and replay the memory that sparked this journey.

I relax. I feel the narrative relax me like a shoreline pool whose waves just stopped- not calm, but not oppressive either. Ahead is a motionless train that would slowly circle the park on a normal day, and I imagine myself riding it, even as I walk past. Somehow this dissociation helps focus me, and I marvel at the sights both local and remote, and hear the echoes in my mind of merriment and carnival style noises.

I climb up some metal stairs to a second story, overlooking where I was, with a closer view now of the time frozen ferris wheel. Leaning on the railing I feel a rush as if wind, though that too is absent physically. My mind, seemingly attuned to the infinitesimal right now, feels you snap a picture, and I turn my head quickly to where the sense of this came from. On a window, to seemingly a small shop not far from me, I catch the tail end of fading fog, with the clear outline of a smiley face visible, though only for a fleeting moment. I see you now in my mind's eye, joyously editing the footage of these paired outings, a universe away, but scooched closer through your efforts. I assist as I can, walking over to the same pane of glass. I crouch and breathe on the outside, and draw a smiley face overlaying where yours was, separated only by a thin, fragile, barrier (or two). Let barrier remain though, until you choose to circumvent or shatter it.

My steps proceed once more, as if of their own accord, with me mindlessly moving through something of a maelstrom that I have crafted in my mind. I find myself more at home in such gusts than when becalmed, and I have become more skilled, as of late, in keeping such preferred states contained within me. This dichotomous internal state helps me enjoy the serenity of my surroundings. Within this internal storm, safe aboard our vessel (or perhaps in our cabin?), I laugh with you, watching over your shoulder as you continue your work of shifting our paths together.

Finally I arrive at the bench, the bench I knew for some time would be here at the base of the ferris wheel, and sit. It is hard sometimes not to feel like a ghost, when so largely unobserved, though I do prefer the privacy of anonymity. As I feel myself fading into the scene, gray though the sun is now shining, I see your eyes pierce through something like forming fog. You see me! You actually see me, I can feel it! This sense sharply draws me back to focus, with heartbeat hastened. I consider this pairing, of one nearly invisible through and through, and another who can spot any observer regardless of difficulty. Such a pairing feels preordained, certain from the moment I saw you, though the delicacy by which we have each approached this moment bolsters courage that pairing approaches a beautiful crescendo. I feel myself slipping away once again, comforted now by your gaze. In this space between seeing and seen, between here and not, I let a final sonnet unfold.

"The complexity of love held in hand

Grasping that hand itself must be retained

Nothing more difficult in all the land

Nothing more critical to be attained

Even when weight of this finds me fading

I sense your gaze searching like a spotlight

Your observation this pain abating

Eyes locked to dawn, though it will take all night

The end ordained, despite which path taken

So it is a blessing you walk with me

Observer observed 'till I awaken

Step by step and hand in hand until free

Free of the weight of this equation borne

When balance lifts load t(w)o find veil untorn."