emotional permanence

Object Permanence is something developed during one's formative years in which a child begins to understand that when an object is out of sight, it still exists. It is at this point when the child becomes excessively clingy towards his or her parents. The child may cry the moment its mother disappears from view.

One day maybe I'll develop Emotional Permanence. That is to say: I will be able to remember that friendship, love, affection, all exist even when they are not totally apparent.


Related:

There is a rap on my window but I barely stir from the dream I am having about a sea gull flying away from me.
In the dream I am running but never moving anywhere though I am begging my feet to carry me over the sandy beach.
Another rap and I am awake but still unaware that the dream I came out of was not real. I think to myself:
Seagulls fly over the ocean but soon they must return to land because there is nowhere for them to perch out on the unsteady water.
I'll have a chance to catch it again.

Another rap and I am aware of my cold room down in the basement that we referred to as the dungeon.
And suddenly the fog clears: it's you. I race to the small ground level window and throw it open, feeling the friction between my heart and my ribcage.
The window is lifted: there is a sudden rush of memories in the form of silky skin against my coarse hands, your teeth nipping my lips like a too-eager puppy, salty skin, and the map of your body, your curves, the dip between your breasts, your birthmark.
Has it only been three months since I swore I would send you away if you ever returned? My resolve is pathetic.
My unending loyalty is yours from the moment you slip gracefully through the window to some undetermined time in the future when I'll come back to an empty room.
And then it will be another four or five months of normalcy with the occasional sleepless night filled with a gnawing certainty that it's me who drives you away.
Feeling the empty half of the bed and occasionally filling it with people who mean
nothing.

You have a new tattoo on your left thigh. Another wolf. You told me once it was your spirit animal and I believed it.
But this time I think you are more like the gull in my dreams than a wolf running with a pack.
I think it looks like charcoal and I try to wipe it away. You take this as a push towards intimacy and then it's all a blur, just as it always is.

* * * *

I can see the Verrazano Bridge from here.
At night it's lit up like a Christmas tree
Even though it's the middle of May.
I'm wearing a thin t-shirt
Proudly displaying traces of lipstick
On the collar.

You're speaking to me and
I'm hearing these chords and lyrics.
Resonant. Pulsing. Turbulent.
Like a fever I can't shake.

My eyes follow the sun as it
Falls into its silent sleep,
Disappears beyond the horizon
Survives only as an imprint on my mind.
And I tell you this.
"You think too much."

You're wearing all black in your usual fashion
All curled up in my brown trench
Like a child in swaddling clothes.
The wind was severe that night,
But I hid my shivers,
Knowing you'd give back my coat if you saw.

"Have you ever thought about how sometime in the future, there will be people in this very spot and they'll have no idea that our shadows are watching them?"
My fingers have somehow found their way into your dyed red hair.
"And you say I think too much."
You reach out a hand.
"I'm touching someone in the future right now.
And we don't even know who."

You're falling asleep in my arms and
I notice the steady beat of the changing wind
Floating in my ears like a distant flute
My head tilts to its song.

Your chest is lifting and falling
I'm breathing in rhythm with you.
Listening to the little whistling sound you make
Every time you exhale.
I remember the story you told me
Before you left the last time.
About two trees that burned,
The smoke from their branches entwining.
You thought it was romantic
Because even in death they were together.

blag

blug