Wiped clear of intention, the pedigree sat to fill a space that character lacked. Imagery could not be used to properly describe the players whose names were formed by the letters on the paper, neither could numbers lend meaning to their age. They simply were and had been forever just as the wind is or dreams are.
It is as such that I found them--that I left them--that I wished I could be one of them. But some beings only touch you for an instant, before they are gone, covered in the life-preserving amber of Memory's embrace.

This is what I live for:
Waking up to crisp morning air, speckled with the smell of rain.
The feeling of a warm sweater straight from the dryer.
A shower and a fresh bar of soap.
the moon and her halo of stars.
The color green.
Belly laughter.
A text from a friend.
Driving fast.
Homemade bread.
Waking up smiling.
Walking on the coast.
My little sister as she runs up to me, hugs me tight and refuses to let go.
Playing card games late at night during the holidays.

Stop. Don't speak. Words cheapen the meaning of this moment. The air's gentle breeze that pushes life from one reality to the next lays softly on my skin. Don't rob me of this moment of comfort, of solitude, of warmth by asking for a deeper meaning.
Nothing is me, but me.
Reality is found in perception's grasp.
It is as it is. It is in who I am.
Stop. Don't ask "why".

How oft do I look at another and say, "Oh, that I were you!"? I see the life, I see their fancy and I want it for my own. Their sparkles and glitz, their loved ones around.
"I would trade you. Yours for mine." I say.
But what is theirs to mine? Yes, the woman walking past is beautiful. But she kind? Yes. The family walking past seems happy...but what happens behind those closed doors? Yes. I...maybe they would trade me, too? Maybe in the changing and the rearranging of our identities we would discover our own discomfort of others, and our own love of self.
Would I change me? Do I wish that I were someone else?

Flighty mind be harnessed.
By the power of my will.
Obey my orders grandly.
My every wish fulfill.
Let down thy guard
for a moment.
Play this game with me.
for then, if in that moment only
all mine, you'll finally be.

The silence feeds me.
It teaches me.
It listens to me.
The soft echos that you
can hear on the wind
speak of the emotion,
the excitement,
in the world.
And when they are gone
and only silence remains
it leaves the residue of
a different emotion
deeper--clearer.
the emotion I feel
for once
is my own.

Sometimes I feel as though I am on the edge of a break through. Some great discovery about life. The wind pushes my hair from my face and birds cry in the distance. Somewhere a ways off the water laps against the rocks of the river and the peace starts to swell...and then it is gone. It was only an instant. And that peace leaves me more confused and aware of my blindness.
But am I the one pulling away from the peace? Does it scare me to know because then, maybe, I'd have to rely on it? Would I rather follow blindly than walk with my eyes open? Or am I really just not ready yet for what that peace--those answers--would mean?