Two Things Can Be True

It looked like a stomachache outside¹. The clouds hunched heavy and low, obscuring all daylight². There was a static in the air, a subconscious cacophony, too subtle to be registered by ears, but loud enough to put your teeth on edge; an all encompassing nothing³.

Humans walked down the street, jaws clenched, looking past each other, through each other⁴. A mumbled murmuration, a collection of thousand yard stares trudged slowly towards an imagined future that didn’t so acutely mirror hell.

Disillusion rested on their shoulders like lead vests⁵. The cognitive dissonance between what was right and what was happening caused each person to feel they would burst apart at any moment⁶.

Photo by Roxanne Paris Barker

They stopped viewing one another as humans. That way it became much easier to do horrible things to each other⁷.

Not willing to trust their lives or happiness to anyone else, they let go of each other and turned inward⁸.

Everything is terrible. Just look around⁹.

1. No it didn’t.

2. What are you talking about? I’m looking out the window right now. It’s sunny and beautiful.

3. Birds. It was birds. Rose-breasted Grosbeaks I think?

4. From my seat on this park bench, I watched two toddlers who just met hug each other.

5. A few minutes later, an eight week old puppy, electric with the thrill of being alive, licked my hand so vigorously I thought he was going vibrate into another dimension.

6. I know. All we ever have is this moment we’re in. Which reminds me, have you ever experienced, really savored, a perfectly lush mango? It’s transcendent.

7. Hey! Excuse me. You dropped your scarf. Sure thing. Have a good one.

8. Can you believe flowers grow out of the ground for free? There’s no reason to have a litany of varieties but there they are- being gorgeous just because. Even in winter, when you think they’ve gone, they’re just sleeping- lying in wait to return, bringing joy to a landscape that’s aching for it.

9. Everything is possible. Just look around.