zzz

I have arranged my curtains a little bit, at least: they are lopsided, but they frame the window now, opening onto my tiny backyard.

I kneel on the kitchen floor. The aging radiator burns on my left side and the cold wind laps at my face. The wind is layered: there is the low growl that I think is the ocean, but it isn't the ocean; Lake Michigan keens in the distance, but the scent is wrong. The lake smells pungent and contained, so unlike the sweet salt wash of the Atlantic, the way I fell asleep to the smell of hibiscus and skin like coconut.

The air is cold and clean, and I rest my chin on the windowsill. I smell an aching body of water and I feel the inchoate winter, its fingertips stroking my neck.

Everything is perfect and defined. The trees are thriving and they know that they are dying. The sky gleams clean, open, empty as ash --

Do you remember what it felt like, that morning, when we held hands? The leaves were drifting down around us, and we were quiet and happy, for a little bit. I sat cross-legged, and I looked at our thumbs, and I looked at your eyes.

I wrap my arms around my knees and lean my head against the window. There is wind and water and sky, and I choke --

-- and I choke, and I rest my head on the windowsill.