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for no other reason than because i must, i begin writing (what i see, the content) lest atrophy and wither these muscles (digital, cranial) that scream out for use. he is awake next to me now, who so recently slept comfortably, unabashedly, in daylight and storelight, in the old musted likelynotcleaned bookstore chair. i cannot do this, midday as he: sinus and snore forbid the act, engagement bars the attempt. he though (now contentedly reading), fearless, qualmless, appoinmentless, scheduleless, can. i am fascinated, fastened as i am to wheres and nows and thingsimustdo. a sigh escapes him, and these can say wordless so much. might be it speaks of comfort: old joints, bones finding settlement, peace in worn and weathered upholstery. could it be post-work, post-effort, cramped lungs spilling out muddy and carbony, yearning to be oxygened, replenished again. or it perhaps is (as this is, this whatever, this thinkless, imprecise utter wander) a breathful, mournful expression of abject need: perhaps it cries of want, of frustration, of doubt, of hunger, an anxious heart expiring out, expunging in airy gasp a manifesto of whatwemustbecome. i, still clinging to last green branches of youth’s autumn, and he having long ago forsaken any claims to such: perhaps there is more between us than first i guessed. now, for no other reason than because i must, i entertain this philosophy (what i otherwise feel, think, believe allowed to peaceably die) lest develop and flourish these sensations (difference, solitude) that are, at root, lies made of earth: cold statues left from ancient craft of man, features worn by time and wind and all corruption, no longer suitable as works of art, unique, brilliant and new, but rendered now hideous and unintelligible, exposed by erosion for what they truly are: simulacra, stiff and grey and dead.
looking up from this i know i must reach out to meet, shake hands, introduce: but his eyes have closed again, lids drawn curtains shutting me out from domiciles within.
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