(L)
It is impossible to tell which features of the river were made by nature and which
were made by us, who are also nature. When I felt I’d floated long enough, I held onto a
branch, strategically positioned by nature or by us, to snag myself, and waited for you to
round the bend. You didn’t and then you still didn’t. Either they caught you and they
dragged you back out, or you drowned, or you decided not to follow me. You were in the
river or you were out, no way around that but impossible to tell which. Well, I thought, as
my arms tired, there’s nothing I can do about this current; it’s a rule enforced either by
nature or by us. I too am either in the river or I’m out. No matter how much I wanted to
see you, nature only gave itself the ability to see reflections, never what casts the
shadows.
(R)
The sunset turned off and on like a lightbulb wired to a switch. That’s just how it
is in this part of the world at this time of year, a bystander commented—like we didn’t all
already know. I walked into the wine allotment store and tried to steal extra bottles by
placing them inside my jacket. They caught me at the register and I handed the extras
back, because of course: no one’s jacket is that big anymore. I walked through one of the
old castle courtyards, looking for the right stairs to climb, a safe place to drink the
allotted wine, no more no less, and wait the whole thing out. The pink of the sagging sun
was a bright, brilliant knife blade, flashing into black then back then black again. I
watched it as I waited, because what else could I do: there is no lightswitch to control
your own sight, except the eyelids, and even they can only shut out so much.
