"Love surprises us. It ends." ~ Eliza GriswoldAccompany, as in provide musical support. Also walk with, be with; hand to hold. Your designated person in ro…  | By Luisa A. Igloria on July 26, 2024 | "Love surprises us.
It ends."
~ Eliza Griswold
Accompany, as in provide musical support. Also walk with,
be with; hand to hold. Your designated person in rooms
claustrophobic with accusation, or just plain overwhelm. Not
dependency, more like mutualism. Woolly bats and pitcher plants,
endosymbiotic algae; pistol shrimp and goby, fig wasp and
fig. We scratched out "obey," exchanging vows. Instead,
gave our word: through sickness, health, mortgages, and sometimes
helium balloons, cake. Then and now, hard to think about that afterlife
in which none of us remain, or only one of us survives the other.
Jumpy times. You're reminded: sink then shoot up from the bottom;
knife through the surface, blubbering for air, though the world's
long arm gathers everything back in after reeling you out.
Maybe it's easy to forget, because there are magical things like flying
noodles in the world; finger limes that burst open with citrus caviar,
octopodes dreaming in multicolor within the depths. Life laps and ebbs,
punctuated at intervals with the effort of striving then stopping,
quieting to a low-key but ever present ripple in the leaves. Do the gods
respond? You're careful to make your meaning clear— Not begging for
special favor, just a decent chance to make good with what you got, time to
tick off a few more boxes. You're a small speck in the universe. Still, to be
useful in some ways, but not begrudged a go, before the end, at those
vaults of sweetness where everyone else is tossing beach balls,
wading in the kiddy pool, drinking herbal infusions out of mason jars.
Xysts lined with eucalyptus and pine, no surveillance drones, where
you could walk together. Not coming or going, just tracing
zigzag threads as if nothing could be more essential, because it is. | | | |
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