alistairmather

went out and foraged with the racoons on campus last night. after a few perfunctory sniffs and some haughty glances they just sort of accepted me. not very good conversationalists are racoons, but they are fairly calming.

i do not like October anymore. once it was my favorite of months for Samhain and autumn and the first snow fall of the year... now it just reminds me of too much i don't wish to recall.

its her birthday in two days. the first one since i lost her nearly a year ago. how do you let go of someone after so long together? how much of an ass was i that she did so quickly?

so in honor of my first bought of depression of the season i have poetry. may all you learn from the stupidity of me and not find your path towards enlightenment suddenly and awfully thrown by that most simple and oft times necessary of things - lonliness.

christ i'm getting soft in my dotage.


Night air bites with the first real chill of fall. Steady chirp of crickets worshipping their eldritch gods. Moisture hangs heavy in the air, giving a barely noticeable, yet obviously present, mass to that which we think of as empty.
A sound.
The soft, amused screech of a pair of students drifting across the Oval. Their steps ring out for a moment in a frenzied rush, then die, as their brief excitement wanes and their rapid steps fade beneath the rising cries of the crickets.
The crickets seem to sound in shifts. A constant rising and falling of tantalizing sound. Over there, a chorus with a basso tone falls silent, while nearer the tentative timbre of a soprano cry steadies to a melodic call.
An ant, sluggish and wary moves within the shadow I cast, pausing for the breifest of moments before before it quickly dives into the deeper dark. Plunging forward in what could be a parody of the fate that awaits it in the coming winters dark.
I breathe deep, tasting the cool wet air, then watching as my lifes warmth hangs upon the tiniest of water particles till entropy and the hungry cold steal its energy and dissipate the form my life has breathed.
Perhaps this is how the soul appears; slipping away silently and slowly, fogged breath by fogged breath, till there is nothing left inside.
As if fate sought to soothe my melancholy, I look up in time to see two young lovers pause beneath the comforting radiance of a lamp to share a breif embrace. For a moment I can imagine the warmth, the fleeting touch, stolen touch of soft flesh on soft flesh, that mutual sharing of warmth and comfort and trust.
I think of her.
I can feel her soft, moist lips like a shadow upon mine. The phantom warmth, the half seen grin as she pulls away, the sense of joy dancing behind sparkling, beautiful eyes.
And then it passes, and the new/old ache of loss replaces the memory of her.
I sigh as I stand, watching again as the night gives shape and form to warm breath, and then takes away that shape and form.
Takes away another piece of my soul.