Microscopes Lurking

I know why you read. It's for the same reasons that I write. Because life is big and we need to take in it small portions.

There's sound and there's fury, but there's not much else. Take this microscope to my moments to see what I couldn't without.

The details. The pieces that create the whole.

The eyelash hairs at the base of its throat. Where its voice waits for something to say. The tiny pixels of color that make up its iris. Where vision debates with the arm of truth.

I know why you read. Slouching on those long ago devotions. When the future hadn't yet been decided. When I still reveled in my longing for you and you still had the privilege of rejecting it.

On paper it looks like we're making progress.

Toward what though?

On paper everything looks different. More merciful. Soft thoughts lend their shadows to the language. And we can taste those feelings in bite size portions. Chew them slowly and never need to swallow.

But there are no more pages turning yellow in my closet anymore. There's no more paper. No more messages.

Just reading. And writing.

Little pieces of having lived.