Touch / Don't Touch

Beneath the skull these days, it's cold and dry.  Try to touch it, and it brushes off on your hand like a butterfly wing, just dust.  

So I don't touch it.  Instead, I take long walks with a big stick and march until the straps of my Jansport pull my shoulders down to my waist.  I walk and think no thoughts, notice no things, worry no worries.  I miss no person.  I hum, sometimes.

I love this city, its million grays.  And it's come to my attention that I have been here long enough to run into people I know on the street!  At the store!  At OHMSI AFTER DARK!  

On my last collision, A boy I worked with last year wrapped his big pillowy arms around me.  What's new? he asked, still holding me, looking down at me with beatific affection.  

Besides the joy of seeing him, the immediate flash of joy to be in arms again, I could think of nothing.  

Nothing, I said, and smiled as a clue to him that he should be happy for me.  He took it and we went on.  

In truth, in the deep worrying heart of me, I can't tell for sure if I meant that smile, that clue.  I can't tell for sure if it's all neutral beautiful grays, or if slowly, I am rubbing away, blowing away, dust.  

The fact is that I want to touch.  Always, I want to tunnel down into things, maul lovers on beaches like otters, punch and bruise, claw and retrieve.  I can't go into a store without running my hands over everything, they watch me more closely, I don't want to take, I just want to touch.  

But I suppose, I'll just have to wait a while.  Maybe in March, maybe in mid-July, I'll be a jungle.  

[illustration- vivienne flesher]