So, write
I am the ghost who stands at the top of the stairs. Being a ghost I see everyone and no one sees me. What are ghosts, really? What are we? Echoes, imprints, parts of selves which have gone out of time. Parts of ourselves which need to be forgiven. And so we still linger. And wait. For that benediction which will never come because those who would have forgiven us have forgotten us. They have gone on, their pieces united, as a whole, have disappeared into the cosmos. We have been left here, to eavesdrop on the mistakes, the same mistakes, made by the living. Unable to warn them, only able to silently witness.
From my vantage point here, I watch the people who live here come and go. I catch fragments of things. It is like being on an old wireless whose signal goes in and out, like the tide, I hear little bits of conversation and then, it goes. I see things, in the tight frame of the stairwell. Usually it is people walking past, going from one room to the next. No one really stays in a stairwell.
I do not remember when I come from. Was it two hundred years ago, or two? I can't make it out. It doesn't work like that for me. There is an immortality to being a ghost which goes beyond being unable to die - when you are out of time, you are from all time, and being from all time it means that everything I witness has a frailty, a melancholy. I know that everything passes, I know that each emotion, while so real at the moment in time, is as transparent, as friable as dust. We are all motes, dancing in a beam of light, all of us, are in a sense ghosts. Only people who are alive don't understand this. So ironically, they act as if they would live forever, instead of understanding that they too, all this too shall pass. It is a paradox - as immortals we know how transient life is, as mortals, we live as if we shall never die. It is not even a difficult paradox to understand, and yet, we don't do this.
Everything seems to be about life and death all the time, doesn't it? Everything seems urgent. Everything seems as if the entire world would be ripped asunder should that thing which we wanted to occur did not occur. And yet, nothing changes. Not really.
The vanity of people! Their small desperate lives. There is a sort of pity which I feel for the slammed doors and the raised voices. The hot, salty tears. The contortions of anger. I see it all because although no one waits in stairwells, they most certainly use it when they are heading into separate rooms.
Can it really be true? Can nothing really matter, in the final analysis?
----------------------------
I lie in bed because I am unable to move. I am aware that the sun that never really rose is now about to set. The muted greys of the afternoon are transforming into absolute darknesses. The sheet of rain that runs down the window pane blurs everything beyond the inside. I am vaguely aware that I still breathe. Breathing is actually the worst part. The worst part. I would have never believed how hard it would be to breathe.
If I could fast forward all this pain and move myself five years into the future I would do it. There is no reason to any of this pain, this pain which is ripping through my entire being, eviscerating me while still alive. How is it possible that there isn't a single mark on my body? How? When I swear I feel run through by knives - by many many knives. I hear the rain pelting above, and for the first time I am deeply, deeply aware of the immobility, the immutability of time. It has stood still and I have come to a stand still within it.
-----------------------------
The sea is warm and the skies are a milky pink. The sunrise is reflected all round. It is gold and then rose gold, and then a deep orange and then the first of the blues. Each second I gaze, the colours change. I realise then, that every moment is different and I never want this moment to end.
I return from the swim, dripping wet. The salt on my arms and legs and in my hair, on my skin, on my face begin to dry and it feels sticky. He is still sleeping. I head to the shower to rinse off the sea. Sand swirls and pools in the corners of the shower tray. I see a little frog blinking at me from the corner of the bathroom. He is here seeking respite from the burgeoning day. I can see the base of his throat, such as it is, pulsing. He is utterly unafraid of me.
I put my hair into a towel and wrap another one around me. Sunrise is over. Everything happens so quickly here and yet, this day will last forever. Stolen from time, this one day. This one day which even the gods will be jealous of.
--------------------------------
Can there be such a thing as a perfect love?
Yes.
--------------------------------
Snow is starting to drift. I put on Faure's Requiem. The snow eddies and circles the wind, it feels as if the music is making the snow dance. As the cadences of music rise and fall, so too does my heart. Despite the snow, the leaves of the birch are starting to come, that new flash of green which is so particular to spring. That new green which was once called a fuse. The sense of things about to burst from the ground and to come forth. This is why we understand Easter.
He is making scrambled eggs and I can hear the soft chink and clunk of a kitchen at work. Metal against metal, glass on wood, that warm, satisfying sound of a sharp blade against the well used chopping board, that gentle rhythmic dance of cooking. I make the bed, pulling the duvet over the sheets and plumping up the pillows. I nearly knock over the Easter branches hung with the shells of prettily decorated Easter eggs. As I set the table, a thought occurs to me suddenly - this is a moment stolen from time - one of many - I smile, the gods will be jealous because there is such a thing as a perfect love.
----------------------------------
I am gazing at his face, his tiny, perfectly well formed face. And then he is holding my finger with his hands. The ends of his fingers are tipped with perfectly form nails, each one a transparent pane of protein and skin beneath which I can see his blood, so warm, moving. His eyes are shut, creating twin moons on his face. I understand for the first time why Krisna's mother looked on in wonder when she asked him to open his mouth and she saw the entire universe with him. She saw the entire cosmos - all the stars, all the suns and all the planet and moons - she gazed in wonder. All of space and time was within his being. Oh the wonder! Oh the joy! Oh the humility! My son, my beautiful son. Within you is the beginning and the end of everything. Oh my dearest heart. I do not know this at that time, but you will save my life - you will save me from myself.
Thank you.
------------------------------------
Everything is cascading - everything is happening all at once. All at once I see everything which I have done and everything I am never going to do. And it all comes down to this one moment. I think I am about to die.
------------------------------------
It is completely dark outside. Beyond the darkness I can see the lights of houses. People are
From my vantage point here, I watch the people who live here come and go. I catch fragments of things. It is like being on an old wireless whose signal goes in and out, like the tide, I hear little bits of conversation and then, it goes. I see things, in the tight frame of the stairwell. Usually it is people walking past, going from one room to the next. No one really stays in a stairwell.
I do not remember when I come from. Was it two hundred years ago, or two? I can't make it out. It doesn't work like that for me. There is an immortality to being a ghost which goes beyond being unable to die - when you are out of time, you are from all time, and being from all time it means that everything I witness has a frailty, a melancholy. I know that everything passes, I know that each emotion, while so real at the moment in time, is as transparent, as friable as dust. We are all motes, dancing in a beam of light, all of us, are in a sense ghosts. Only people who are alive don't understand this. So ironically, they act as if they would live forever, instead of understanding that they too, all this too shall pass. It is a paradox - as immortals we know how transient life is, as mortals, we live as if we shall never die. It is not even a difficult paradox to understand, and yet, we don't do this.
Everything seems to be about life and death all the time, doesn't it? Everything seems urgent. Everything seems as if the entire world would be ripped asunder should that thing which we wanted to occur did not occur. And yet, nothing changes. Not really.
The vanity of people! Their small desperate lives. There is a sort of pity which I feel for the slammed doors and the raised voices. The hot, salty tears. The contortions of anger. I see it all because although no one waits in stairwells, they most certainly use it when they are heading into separate rooms.
Can it really be true? Can nothing really matter, in the final analysis?
----------------------------
I lie in bed because I am unable to move. I am aware that the sun that never really rose is now about to set. The muted greys of the afternoon are transforming into absolute darknesses. The sheet of rain that runs down the window pane blurs everything beyond the inside. I am vaguely aware that I still breathe. Breathing is actually the worst part. The worst part. I would have never believed how hard it would be to breathe.
If I could fast forward all this pain and move myself five years into the future I would do it. There is no reason to any of this pain, this pain which is ripping through my entire being, eviscerating me while still alive. How is it possible that there isn't a single mark on my body? How? When I swear I feel run through by knives - by many many knives. I hear the rain pelting above, and for the first time I am deeply, deeply aware of the immobility, the immutability of time. It has stood still and I have come to a stand still within it.
-----------------------------
The sea is warm and the skies are a milky pink. The sunrise is reflected all round. It is gold and then rose gold, and then a deep orange and then the first of the blues. Each second I gaze, the colours change. I realise then, that every moment is different and I never want this moment to end.
I return from the swim, dripping wet. The salt on my arms and legs and in my hair, on my skin, on my face begin to dry and it feels sticky. He is still sleeping. I head to the shower to rinse off the sea. Sand swirls and pools in the corners of the shower tray. I see a little frog blinking at me from the corner of the bathroom. He is here seeking respite from the burgeoning day. I can see the base of his throat, such as it is, pulsing. He is utterly unafraid of me.
I put my hair into a towel and wrap another one around me. Sunrise is over. Everything happens so quickly here and yet, this day will last forever. Stolen from time, this one day. This one day which even the gods will be jealous of.
--------------------------------
Can there be such a thing as a perfect love?
Yes.
--------------------------------
Snow is starting to drift. I put on Faure's Requiem. The snow eddies and circles the wind, it feels as if the music is making the snow dance. As the cadences of music rise and fall, so too does my heart. Despite the snow, the leaves of the birch are starting to come, that new flash of green which is so particular to spring. That new green which was once called a fuse. The sense of things about to burst from the ground and to come forth. This is why we understand Easter.
He is making scrambled eggs and I can hear the soft chink and clunk of a kitchen at work. Metal against metal, glass on wood, that warm, satisfying sound of a sharp blade against the well used chopping board, that gentle rhythmic dance of cooking. I make the bed, pulling the duvet over the sheets and plumping up the pillows. I nearly knock over the Easter branches hung with the shells of prettily decorated Easter eggs. As I set the table, a thought occurs to me suddenly - this is a moment stolen from time - one of many - I smile, the gods will be jealous because there is such a thing as a perfect love.
----------------------------------
I am gazing at his face, his tiny, perfectly well formed face. And then he is holding my finger with his hands. The ends of his fingers are tipped with perfectly form nails, each one a transparent pane of protein and skin beneath which I can see his blood, so warm, moving. His eyes are shut, creating twin moons on his face. I understand for the first time why Krisna's mother looked on in wonder when she asked him to open his mouth and she saw the entire universe with him. She saw the entire cosmos - all the stars, all the suns and all the planet and moons - she gazed in wonder. All of space and time was within his being. Oh the wonder! Oh the joy! Oh the humility! My son, my beautiful son. Within you is the beginning and the end of everything. Oh my dearest heart. I do not know this at that time, but you will save my life - you will save me from myself.
Thank you.
------------------------------------
Everything is cascading - everything is happening all at once. All at once I see everything which I have done and everything I am never going to do. And it all comes down to this one moment. I think I am about to die.
------------------------------------
It is completely dark outside. Beyond the darkness I can see the lights of houses. People are
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