she walks, picturing a line running out from
the toes of her shoes straight ahead into the horizon. she keeps her
thoughts on these steps---that slight collision of body and earth that
gives the sense of the words 'being grounded.' she feels her limbs
and torso, head and shoulders. they are part of her, yet there is a
disconnection, a slight almost unconscious inclination of the mind to
think that it could do without the body. that all its urges and
sensations are distractions from something greater: a riddle that the
brain could solve if only the body would leave it alone, one that
would explain the meaning of god, the cosmos, of physics and cells and
all the works of art and literature---something that would elevate
the mind that could see clearly the answer to the 'why?' echoing behind
this human life.
If buddha is right, perhaps all we want is freedom from suffering,
freedom caused by desire, but the body is only half of what
desires---is not the yearning for peace or nirvana, an elaborate
desire of the mind?
her walk takes her from cement to gravel, to sand to rock. she stops at
this point, the horizon line stretching out north to south and onward
into a seemingly limitless west. how immense the space between water
and sky, even while boundaries have been drawn by men of all sorts of
vocations and types wanting to know how far the human race had to
expand itself on order to become the supreme master of all. but their
knowledge only concerns those who make it their concern, and now,
looking at it, she feels that despite the calculations made by some
geographer or cartographer, Japan does not lie some hundred thousand
miles or so ahead, but off in some otherworldly place called
Japanland, a universe of its own that goes on indefinitely: earth,
sky, water, placid and tempestuous---the closest to 'forever' that her
mind can grasp. in this way, she can feel herself both absent yet
alive in a way she could never put into words. she will age and live a
life independent from this moment. but in this time and space there
is something sacred created, not by any deliberate action; through her
contemplation and stillness: a thing that will stand far longer in
the silent histories of this world than anything else she might do or
say.
she takes a breath, looks at her watch, and turns back to walk to her car and go home.
Japan
Nicole Villarreal Stivers is a writer currently residing in Seattle. She spends her spare time trying to start a small absurdist revolution through quiet means: [groups.myspace.com/riotthroughconfusion]