Tomato Cage

A moment to myself. Loss. Love. Memories I'd long to know again. Seeing my end - a bad smashup, a concussion, others in the vehicle injured and unconscious - and not knowing it was a beginning 30 years ago. Enjoyed those Sun cycles, though. The word 'wasted' sneaking up from behind and swatted away, perspective proving that hindsight's gnatty. A life. My life. Always in reserve for others' use. To whom do I belong? No one. The universe just another chorus of the cover song. Let the squirrel chew on the wood of the lawnmower trailer rusting on the side of the driveway. My body and this computer the only one getting the message. The joke. The world my vaudeville show. Another squirrel. Red head. Gray tail. The two soon playing chase in the woods. A third on alert, hanging upside-down on bark. Romper room. My brother in-law's death. Sudden. Irrecoverable. Called my hand. I'm holding an ace, not enough to win the table but hides the joker up my sleeve. Words beating out rhythms and I unable to sing solo with a karaoke machine. Fortified irony. Stomach grumbling. Complaining. It's five o'clock somewhere. Today I'm underage. Rooibos my redheaded treat today, peanut butter and plum jam the sides. I'm not tired of living. I'm tired of words, glad three-dimensional language is almost ready to be heard. Learned my lesson a long time ago. Promise them the moon while you walk off with the brass ring and give it to the first person who passes by. Carl taught me that one long, long ago - anonymous giving's more rewarding than your name on a side of a building. Without a title, no one can call your name. Without a name, you're nobody. When you're nobody, you're somebody. We social animals aren't meant to understand. This ecosystem does, the nameless generations going on and on and on. I play with words on this page but I live to be forgotten. Faceless billions of me have died, honored by disheartening wars or simple lives raising vegetables, their names unimportant. In this moment, my nirvana, years searching for hope washed away. Found. Words useless but used. Flooded with happiness. A hermit. A pilgrim. I share it with you because we are social animals, a fact I don't dispute. This moment is all I have and all I ever needed. I couldn't think of anyone else more important than you to share it with. And I really thought I came here to be alone, finding out time and time again that being alone with you is what it's really all about.