scruta

Now there are days when I see nothing at all. The city has grown familiar, and as a result, invisible.

These streets have too many stories. When I walk down them, I no longer see them. I walk through the past, oblivious to everything before me. I don’t see signs. I see the sets for heated conversations and philosophical rants to nothing nothing. I don’t see the wavering expressions of strangers. I see the eyes of acquaintances come and gone, peering at me across time. I don’t see the pleading of storefront displays. I see the shops that came and went before, and the anxious owner smoking cigarettes on the pavement outside.

There are no cracks in the pavement. There are only the scars of ineffable moments of joy, grief, panic, love. There are no young savages decamped to the park at midnight to bathe in reefer glow. There are only trees and the turning of seasons. There no old crones oggleing me from under swaddles of clothing in the morning sunlight. There is only the sunrise over half-finished buildings, now finished. All is invisible now.

I stumble about like a blind man, muttering to myself, unaware that others are in my presence. I am chanting, ranting, raving, praying.

Some part of me hopes it will restore my sight.