Physicians have discovered a new epidemic that has infected every living organism on Earth. They reported that the average person will not experience any symptoms until the last stages of the illness, when the patient might experience pain a few minutes before their demise, in some selected cases the pain begins several years, a year, or a month, before the body is finally shut down. Physicians don’t know what has caused the disease, they don’t know how to cure it, or prevent it, but they are sure that it threatens us every day, it nourishes from within, and when the time is right it unexpectedly devours us from our existence. They’ve named it Death.
You’re probably trying to figure out the meaning behind this piece, and the last thing I want to do is worry you with thoughts of death, because I know how much you despise it, but the idea of ever missing my chance to tell you all the things I’ve carefully hidden in unsent letters was hunting me to the point where I had to take a blank sheet of paper and write so that perhaps when your–or my- time comes you leave conscious of the changes you’ve made through our late night conversations, the feelings you have evoked in me, and the happiness sometimes shared together. I have so idly communicated with you, that now I feel as if I could write a book about our short time jointly. I’ve been such a coward, really. I’ve felt so short next to you, you who has experienced so much, and loved so much, and lost so much. You, who has become that sharp flawed reality I was not ready to experience, the sweet bitterness that flows from the lips that have universally silenced mines so that I no longer desire to speak in tongues, but rather with my hands, and my eyes, as you tale tell endless stories of adventures left behind. Despite the unspoken, I feel like you know me, and yet, you know nothing. Unfortunately, by the last sentence of this essay you will realize that certain words will remain untouched, untold, as if the thought of your hands had never crossed my mind, or as if I had not seen you that day smiling back at me, as the light from a sunny day reflected on your face, while I laughed from across the room, intoxicated with laughter, until your smile consumed my world, and robbed all thoughts from my mind. Those words will remain quiet and vanish through a thick winter breeze, as if it were not true that I trembled at your gaze, and that your perfection silenced my smile, and that I had accepted you and loved your mind, though you were not always perfect. You might be left to wonder and hypothesize of all the things I so yearn to show you and tell you, but out of this piece if anything should be acknowledged let it be the fact that I have loved you, and that the word itself (love) has been so mistreated, and misused that I was careful to never admit that, in fact, “I love you” from fear that the feeling itself would disappear.
But here, if I were to leave tomorrow, or next month, or next year I will leave having said the things I believe you deserved to listen, and I am sorry if I never told you enough the wonderful human being you are, it’s so simple, really, and yet we’ve found it so difficult to complement each other, when the reality is that your support has been the solid rock of my motivation. I’ve spent hours on the run, cheating time day-by-day, and there has not been a minute when I have not stopped to think of you. Here, now you know everything. So let us continue to live in the shadow of the unknown, as I let you, my friend, populate all my senses with your presence, and even at times with your absence.
Note: Forever editing.
thesoberspectrum 