impact

This is no mistake, no random act of happenstance. The flowering of every fissure, the bloom of each crack and line. Bruised bones and twisted steel, the indelible impression of the moment of impact. It is the moment that every ache and impulse was birthed, the root and branch of this life. The weary weight of limb and tongue. The bleary gleam of open at last. This is the sense in the season, the marker on the map casting its shadow into the world. This is your life, written on the back of a matchbook. This is your life, written in leaf and stone.

It can be hard to fathom, all this spilled instance. It can be hard to watch, all the evidence gathered. The wrecked spells and the broken oaths. The clipped witness of each misstep and mistake. The fierce derailing of the most carefully laid plans, sounding out louder than any bell or chime. The calamity of firm belief meeting fact head on, that mad collateral of the empirical weighing in. It is quite the journey, the distance between said and done.

I don't know how I got here. I don't know where I am going, or much about where I've been. The sun and stars all perch along familiar axes, the journey of the chariot and the music of the spheres all lined up just so. Day and night, and all the business in between. The word works according to its mysteries, the clock works according to its parts. The news imbues every devil with its details. I arrive dead center, in the middle of the road. I begin in the same place, no matter where I am. The moment of impact all there is, apart from all I miss.