Briefer Than Shadows

Think of sunsets, think of standing on the balcony of some villa not compromised, not sold, and seeing an ocean as though its colors and expanse were almost new to you... (from the archives)

Note: This piece first appeared on Juke in August of 2024. I wanted to borrow its sunlight today, along with the whole extraordinary universe it brings into being… TM

Photo by Iain Kennedy on Unsplash

Do you recall the day when you stood by yourself, reading a book on K— Gata, and I saw you but you did not see me, because I have mentioned that day to you many times, though I cannot say how my talking about that day appeals to you, if it appeals to you, but let us be honest, you have often asked me to recall that day, and I have, and I have told you honestly about the sunlight touching your body and your body dazzling the sunlight, to which you have replied, Ah, the usual bits and parts, and Yes, I have answered, except the usual bits and parts belong only to you, and perhaps this startled another occasion in your memory, say when we sat in a café, the one that you favored and where there remains an unexpected turning of eyes and eyes meeting eyes, and similar to the day when I saw you, there is not enough of you or me to recall, though I ask you now, are there better moments than when we abandon ourselves into enchantments never to be repeated or repeated again in the same way, but think of this: think of sunsets, think of standing on the balcony of some villa not compromised, not sold, and seeing an ocean as though its colors and expanse were almost new to you, as though it were all almost new, yes the ocean, yes the expanse, yes the color of blue, yes the scent of a two-hundred year old garden planted around the villa, scenting not simply the villa itself or your heart but your eyes, too, and think of the gate you pushed open to discover roses that you never knew existed, roses climbing the trellis of a neglected garden where water still drips from the mouth of a stone lion, greened by time and liquid from some other age no one, not even the locals can recall, and yet before you is the true color of roses, their true scent, and the suddenness that saturates you with an over-abundance of love (can we call this love?) but whose presence is a memory, yet as much as you have searched, privately or when you believe no one is looking, the way we touch our old wounds and scars, you will not be able to conjure this garden so fully, you cannot order such things, you cannot duplicate what has been given once, and yet, you will remember this encounter or similar encounters wherever you are, and let us say you are in this same café where you sat with me, where you drink coffee or eat breakfast before the day breaks over you, when you are neither pleased nor anxious, but you are waiting, and what you are waiting for cannot be hymned into clarity with words, for to add words, in some measure, is to engage too much of yourself, and you are not waiting for yourself, rather you are waiting for what is without words, without clarity, without hope, certainly without your hope, but then you will return to that day or to some other day that abides in a strange dimension, and you are aware then that your movement must be limited, that you must set the cup down and hear its click and pause and let sunlight return to you, and afterwards, you will rise to draw a small glass of water from a clear jar, but notice how gently you hold the glass when you return to the table, to your seat, and how you sit down carefully and let your hands rest on the table again and again a day returns, not yet with the scent of roses or the blue of some peculiar ocean or expanse, but of us touching hands and the agony of forbidden lips, of us existing within and outside of a dream that neither of us created, a summons closer to mere air than to mere hearts, and all at once you are filled again, in seconds perhaps, when soon there will be the pleasure of an ocean, of a gate and roses, of a scented world and of this café and hopes registered in the people around you, of the goofy slant of your head, the lean of your own shoulders that you are not aware of when the waiter returns to ask if everything is okay or will you be needing anything else, and you hear him, you see him, but in something less than a moment, briefer than shadows, you will not know what to say—

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Damon Falke is the author of, among other works, The Scent of a Thousand Rains, Now at the Uncertain Hour, By Way of Passing, and Koppmoll (film). He lives in northern Norway.

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