it’s like a sub-audible thing.
i could hear it buzzing in the background several days ago. it had been long enough that i couldn’t identify it. just under consciousness, not yet loud enough to draw attention. i dismissed it as distraction and carried on, of course.
the next time i noticed it, it was louder. more of a whine like a metal strand plucked, still with the sense of resonance that would be a buzz, but twangier. the thought i had of how it sounded was like a mouth-saw might sound to inadvertently strike a tooth.
and still, i could not identify it fully. and still, it was not recognizable.
last week, as i was waking from another life, i heard it again… but this time, i felt it as well. in a flash, i knew. the same weight, the same immediate sense of missing, the same emptiness throbbing and the unending question that remains unanswered.
i shook my head to send it to the depths. set the boards firmly over it and refused to as much as whisper a word, a name, anything.
this last week i have felt it vibrating there, the ripples of movement finally making it up to a level where detection is unavoidable.
sighing, i turned my awareness to it and simply waited. what? what now? what next? it buzzed and skittered through my mind, down the nerve endings, into my hands, which obligingly tapped the appropriate symbols and requested reply.
when it arrived, i understood. a week ago to the day. locked in and secured, the last of the last of the last absorbed. like a desert receiving rain; arid and void of greenery, cracked with its own lust, grabbing eagerly and pulling into crevices…. the desert never admits it wants the rain, would as well see a flood as accept it. but leave the water upon the ground and look away….
shook my head, let the poor thing tumble out and into freedom. waved it away with weary hands. go. go on. the days of other than disinterest have passed. take “your” rain, place it in the grainy, dry abyss and gloat over it when summer blazes.
all this, in the periphery and then, in a blink, gone. only the lightest touch of what once was melancholy remains. i remember when that fire scorched place was a meadow. i remember the sweetness of wildflowers and bees heavy with honey. i remember when the air quivered with rain’s promise and i remember giddy, free laughter under starlight, by firelight.
all things pass.