I am the dog in this scenario

Give me a life that is not hoping, because now I am hoping for something that is not visible in my mind. I can not describe what it is I am hoping for because it is too far away. I do not see a picture anymore of what I hope. The picture is gone. It is not even blurry, it is gone altogether. Can someone bring it back? Could he ever bring it back? And I am spending my hours in mindless state of not wanting to know; not wanting to let go of something that is not. I drug myself knowingly. Not only do I drug myself literally but also figuratively. I now live by the week, sometimes even by the day.

When I am alone I sometimes cry for five seconds, not much more than that. Then I look up and force myself to stop. This morning he has called me to ask me if he should worry about me and I said no. The worrying should be done by me, not by him, because all his worrying leads to destruction. Am I waiting for the moment the blood through his veins will reach his mind and tell him I am in it? If I am in his blood it will only scare him more. And if it won’t scare him anymore it will maybe scare me because I live to conquer. I am scared of myself and therefore I feel comfortable being around someone who scares me more than myself. I can worry about the thoughts running through his mind so I don’t have to worry about the thoughts running through mine. I can run without knowing whereto. I will not be disappointed anymore than I have been disappointed already.

We stand under a wooden roof. There are some benches and a table. There is a dog and there is us. We feed the dog and then we walk to the stream. The water is hot and brown and reaches our knees. Dry season. We wade through it and don’t say much. The dog follows us everywhere because he knows we are good people that will not kick him. We feed him meat. Do we know we are good people?

I am giving us hours, days, weeks, and months…time. In my eyes time has always been precious but not measured. One moment can be as precious as one entire year. I didn’t waste 200x, he says to me. Tell me my love, if you didn’t waste 200x, why is it that you are so convinced that you want to throw away all the time you haven’t wasted? Can you explain this to me?

You can not even explain it to yourself, can you? I am speaking now to “him”, and then to “you”, mocking all the rules of writing. I am speaking to who will listen, I am speaking to me. It is no use: I will not listen. I need to feel the burns on my brain and around my heart. Why don’t I ever let go until I am kicked? I am the dog in this scenario.

(LB, April 2005)