I feel the need to capture this moment, this time, an urgent, overwhelming need, sensing its importance in the way my body trembles, fills, veins pulsating with inexplicable energy, heart yearning for something I cannot clearly see but feel with every fiber of my being. Something paramount to my soul.
Time slips by, gently stubborn in its persistence, and from this vantage point I see how incredibly intricate life is, how detailed the pain, how masterful the joy, how complex the indecisions, the fears, the loss. I see, too, how it fades, how the colors from just a few years ago shine less brightly, the lines blur, the power to move there, but quieter, less explosive. Kneeling now, as over a stream, watching hopelessly upstream as it moves, so far, then here, now, in front of me, swirling, beautiful, treacherous, and, instantly, gone, moving down to an unseen end. Submerging my arms, angry, frustrated when it flows through them, around them, over them, defying my insistence that it stop, pool here, and allow me to bathe in it, relish it.
Cupping my hands, bringing this life water to my lips, drinking it in, tasting, absorbing, but painfully, sadly aware that so much passes by, that I cannot drink it all, that no matter when I drink, where, how much, it will never be enough to quench, there will always be more. But finding solace as it slides down my hands, my throat, filling me with experience, sustaining me, nourishing, in its own way, with good and with bad.
Gathering some of my life in a large jar, a glass jar, clear, keeping it visible to me, keeping this keepsake, this treasure. I want a thousand jars, a million, I want to bottle all that I drink, line the bottles here, along the shore, sun backlighting, shining through, shimmering as I recollect, remember what each jar holds, re-live, re-drink. Surrounded by jars, by the beautiful and the sad, the clear and the muddy, the pure and the unfiltered, kept safely forever, I would lie here, watching each, knowing, satisfied, happy that I've captured the stream, that it passes by no more, and I can hold it to my chest, comforted by its tangible presence.
But I have only a few jars, a few memories captured, and not an infinite supply of jars for those to come. So I kneel here on the shore, quiet, removed, observant. Watching life flow by, drinking when I can, but always with one eye on that water that I cannot capture, always wondering how it would taste, what it would bring me. Always thirsty for more.
Original post date 5-23-06
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