Poetic communion, something like that, while everyone else is taking care of
business, at 2:49 pm my day has already been longer than most people have been
alive. Whatever we’re trading would be fine enough if I could just stop crying long
enough to say I’ve had enough of this constant leaving. It is not like I haven’t proven
I am chronically alone. There’s nothing particularly special about that. All these
adjectives you keep telling me I use too often, as if I didn’t already understand how
clearly my vocabulary is so impoverished. You’re smarter than me I suppose. We are
not the science of money, architecture of an emotional life, or balance of
sensibilities. We are something simpler. At least that’s what I’ve been told. For more
accuracy I look at my daughter’s drawing on the desk, which she has titled “A
butterfly in 100 blades of grass.” That’s action on the calendar. A glass of milk. A
sedative. Even she knows well the productive use of longing.