chapter two

December 13^th, 2010. 10:36 P.m.

 

 

         The night was cracking with storm. I was locked in the cell of indoors. The sky’s excessive raging waters begun to drown me in my home. You’ve been alone for three days, you need to get out of here I told myself in frustration (though I had really been alone for much longer, for years). The hours were dragging clouds of loneliness over me and I had begun to be driven insane. The successive splatter of the rain echoed in my mind. If I tried to sleep to escape in my dreams then the storm would bring loud thunder. If I tried to tune out to the voice of the television then the rain would fall harder, stabbing the signal of the cable. So I let it win, I faced the anxiety of its wails because I did not know what else to do. Rain drop. Tick of time. Yet I was going nowhere.

            I feasted on my dreadful thoughts, letting them consume me. I began to release what I had locked up, letting my emotions pour freely from my subconscious, from my mind, from my body. After the thoughts were discharged from their cell I became an animal. All I could think of were the memories and time. The passing of time, and the loss of happiness. The passing of time which was supposed to have allowed me to find myself, so she could find me, so I could be with her. Time did not show sympathy, because dryness grew upon me. The beat of her memory played in my mind, I sung it from my lips and so I then sought to hold it. I knew where I had hidden it too. A smile snuck itself upon my face as I slowly walked from my room to the stairs leading to the attic.

I found the boxes that I had tapped the memories in and opened them frantically, ripping off the tape and throwing it to the floor of the room, destroying it so that it could not be used again, so that the boxes could never be covered. I opened them and I wished I had not, but I was so glad to see their contents. For a moment I had her back, until the reminder of her absence crashed louder then the thunder of the storm which trapped me in.

            Photo- albums. Clothes. Drawings. Letters. Poems. Books. Love. Happiness. Then sadness. Loss. Loneliness. Bitterness. Anxiety. Longing. My mind was a rainbow of emotion and I wanted to keep it that way forever, until I had her back to replace it with the shade of the sun that her smile was. She was so beautiful in the pictures, eyes so captivating. The words in her letters were so passionate. Her art was so inspiring. Her clothes so unique. She was everything I had always wanted to be, everything that I had admired. She was a consistent stream of self- expression. She was right, she knew who she was and that was a person who deserved to be free, who needed to be free. The canvas of her old life was too small for her brush; she needed the world. I hoped she was ok, I hoped that she had found everything she had been looking for even though I had found nothing, only suffered the hardships of more loss.

            I hung her art on my wall, I placed her writing on my mirrors so that I would see it when I saw myself. I put her clothes in my dresser, hoping that they would bring her back. You don’t know who you want to be. You don’t know what you want. You don’t know who you are. Her words repeated in my head and I tried to answer them. Who do you want to be? I asked myself, demanded of my soul. I wanted to be a person that she could love, it answered. I wanted to be a person who knew who they were, someone like her. I wanted to be her. What do you want? I implored. I want her. Who am I? I wondered. I did not know.

            The dream! I reminded myself. I knew that all of the answers I had were there. She had sent me the dream as a means of release from my angst, I knew she had. She wanted us to be together again just as much as I did, maybe even more. I shivered at the idea of love stronger then mine, it was impossible. Go back to the dream, I urged myself. Remember what she was trying to tell you. As I sat and rocked back and forth, swaying in and out of its recollection, I could not enter it. I wondered how I had done it last time. What had allowed me to enter that state of mind? I did not know.

 

 

December 14^th, 2010. 1:20 A.M.

 

I find poems that she wrote me.

Enfolding Intimacy

 

My body rests beneath yours pregnant with desire,

I moan as you kiss me with fire, the flames growing higher with each touch,

thrusts stroked upon me, fingers dancing on my skin to the music of lust,

to the breath of my pulse as it climbs,

while your eyes search mine, seeking my soul,

holding me like a flower hugs its petals as they perish with time.

Tingles torch my pores and they open to the pitch of your passion,

pleasure paints the canvas of my body,

drawing beaming images shaded with the scent of your sweat.

Your grunts caress my flesh,

calling my satisfaction from its cave

as it answers craving the sound of your sweetness.

Frames racing, indulgence stirring acceleration,

senses stagger from intoxication,

swaying on a swing, soaring until soaked in exhaustion,

then bodies still, static with smiles,

lungs galloping in the pastures of awe,

souls serene in the showers of adoration,

sensations of joy wrapping our bodies,

molding us into one as we whisper,

knowing that while the petals of our love may wither,

our fallen seeds will sprout to flourish a new flowered figure.

The image excites us and we open our hearts

to release the urges stirred, letting them fly like free birds.

 

 

December 14^th, 2010. 2:05 A.M.

 

More poems, haunting me.

I Want To Make Love To You

 

I want to make love to your hands

As they cradle mine,

Mirroring the intensity of my grasp,

Warming my fingers with smiling rays.

 

I want to make love to your eyes

As their gaze finds my fears and confronts them,

Thrusting hope into my soul,

Pupils shinning with faith.

 

I want to make love to your lips

As they whisper promises,

Placing their pecks up and down my neck

The water of your kiss extinguishing my doubt.

 

I want to make love to your limbs

As they lead me through unexplored shadows,

Bringing me to sublime seas, to magic meadows,

Helping me climb up mountains, up frightening cliffs.

 

I want to make love to your song

As you sing it with passion,

Saving me from silence,

Stirring in me a craving to dance to the music.

 

I want to make love to your dreams

As they stream into mine,

Licking their dryness with strength,

Faith painted on their canvas in wild, vivid strokes.

 

I want to make love to your body

As it enfolds me with pleasure,

Teasing my arousal, grazing sensitive spots

Until the hunger of my lust is fed.

 

I want to make love to you

Underneath every sunrise, every sunset.

I want to make love to you

When we lay exhausted in bed.

I want to make love to you

After we have taken our last breath.

 

 

December 14^th, 2010. 2:38 A.M.

 

            Think, think, I begged myself. Ok, you  had been sitting on your couch, watching T.V. like you do everyday and you started to panic because you suddenly realized that this was your fate for every evening to come. Remembering that feeling birthed it once again in my core. I cried. I did not want to accept that fate as a possibility- I had a chance! I could find happiness in life with or without her… But I realized that I could never find happiness without her. Not only because I loved her, but because of what it would mean if I could not have her, if she could not come back to me. It would mean that I was stuck in the mask I wore walking with limbs that were not mine. She promised me she would come back once I had found myself, once I knew who I was, and once I knew what life was. If she never came back then that would mean I had never found myself and that I had not understood life. I could not live like that. I needed to hear the song of my soul, of myself. I wanted to hear it with the chirping of morning birds, to hear it sing above the honking streets I paced, to let the lullaby to sleep. I needed to feel like I was going somewhere in my life, and I needed to understand what life was! What its purpose was, why I was here, I needed to be a part of myself, I needed to be a part of the world. I wanted to live with the world, not merely in it. I wanted to be able to turn off the television and bask in the beauty of silence.

            Upon these realizations came fragments of the cat’s faces, the scene of my room erased and the streets of the dreams city were sketched before me. Yes, I prayed. I needed to want to remember the dream for myself, not just for her. I needed to want to answer these questions for my own sake. Answering them would bring her back, but it was necessary to answer them because I wanted to live my life whether or not she was in it. I needed to be, to feel happiness, to become an artist and paint the canvas of my life whether or not the color of Anne could be struck upon its whiteness. The bland walls of my room became replaced with graffiti dressed buildings and a warm freshly birthed morning that licked my skin with dew. I could see the woman pacing away on the street opposite of which I stood. I knew I was not meant to talk to her though, no matter how great my longing to do so was, I was here to follow the cats. I looked down to where they nuzzled me with their fur, welcoming me back and I spoke to them.

            “Take me there.” I pleaded. They did so gladly, skipping before me and leading me down the street, past the strong old woman, past the alley of our encounter and thorough streets littered with bored pedestrians. The other pacers of the pavement did not look at me, I do not think that they could see me, they could not see anything outside of their reality and I was seeking that of truth, a different world entirely from that of which they knew, that of which they understood. They continued on, walking past me in the opposite direction, checking the journey of time, ignoring the shining of the sun. Straightening their coats, walking past the new blossom of flowers. I danced with the cats, my fingers pecked the petals of flowers. I tilted my head back and let the sun’s rays warm my face. I had chosen the right road, of this I was certain. I was afraid, terrified. I knew that I would learn truths and suffer hardships of which I would not have to undergo had I chosen a different path, but this roads destination would take me to a glowing meadow ringing with my song, while the others would take me to empty rooms flooded with the sound of rain. We continued on the streets for quite some time. For how long? I do not know.

            I was not burdened with the nagging of a clock, my heart was too focused on the sublime sights surrounding me. I was too absorbed in how interesting my own thoughts were. However, just when I wondered where they were taking me, right when my soul longed to progress through the dream, the cats stopped. We had come to a rich street lined with large, exquisite buildings. The cars that were parked upon it shone. I could see women dressed in pastel colored silk gowns, smoking on their balconies as their gaze rested in the sunrise tinted horizon. The only inhabits of the street’s gravel were children though. No adults roamed around us. It was a lovely scene, one of which spoke to me through sweet lips. The softness of the lips reminded me of Anne. My thoughts were interrupted when a ball belonging to the group of children playing in the road flew towards me. I caught it with ease, shocked when they spoke to me.

            “Sir!” the smallest of the children called, her voice delicate with innocence. “can you pass it to us?” she asked, stepping towards me with a smile. I obliged, throwing it gently to her open arms. It glided past her though, landing near the opening of a sewer and then rolling into the entrance.

            I cringed with sorrow at the sound of the children’s disappointment. Their frowns shaded the light pouring from the sky.

            “I’m so sorry!” I yelled, overcome with guilt.

            “Its ok!” she girl who had missed the ball reassured me. “We have plenty more and we needed a break anyways.” She walked towards me and patted the back of my hand as it swayed awkwardly at my side.

            “What’s your name?” Another asked me curiously. The voice belonged to a small male with pale freckled skin and wild hair. Wild like Anne’s messy mane. Messy but silky nevertheless.

            “Harry.” I answered loudly as the wind carried my respond to them. The group of children all began to come to me. I retreated several steps back, startled.

            “Its ok!” the girl in front of me comforted my nerves, my uncertainty, my doubt, my fear.

            “Who are you?” I asked, unsure if I could trust them.

            “Children of the world!” a large Asian boy laughed, rolling his eyes. “Isn’t that part obvious? What I’d really be asking if I were you is why we’re here.”

            “That was my next question,” I admitted, my lips rising into a smile.

            “Well we can’t answer that.” The boy replied as I was sure he would. “You have to figure that out yourself.”

            “But we can tell you what we’re going to show you before we go about doing it.” A squeaky black boy said, soothing me. He was the next from the group to reach me and stood strongly by my side upon doing so. I felt him grab my hand, bringing it to sway with an unknown beat.

            “Its not an unknown beat!” he told me with annoyance. “I can hear the song of your soul even though you can’t. This is how I’ve chosen to dance to it.” He said proudly. He picked up the pace of our swaying and tapped his feet. I was envious, but motivated by his ability to dance with my mystic beat.

            “When will I hear it?” I wondered aloud to the children.

“When you’ve completely re-lived the dream of course!” the innocent girl said, taking my other hand, bringing my arm to swing in a way different from the boy clinging to the fingers opposite.

            “My dance is like this.” She giggled, causing me to mirror her sound.

            “I can’t wait until I can show you my dance…” I said sadly, but happy with hope.

            “Don’t be silly,” the girl said. “you’ll never see us again. You’ll never have this dream again, its your only chance, so enjoy it while you may! Life isn’t always going to guide you, but then again, once you’ve found yourself you won’t need a guide, you won’t even want one.”

            “Yeah, we’ll be useless to you!” the boy competing with her song-expressing movement agreed.

            “I see.” I said, intrigued by their words, thoughts racing through my head, eager to finish the marathon that this dream was. “Well, I should introduce myself before we get started then. I’m Harry.”

“So, we’re all here to tell you a story.” The innocence of the females voice explained. “My name is Meredith. This is Tom,” she said pointing to the black child who continued to hold my hand though his dancing had stopped. “Over here we have Zack,” her fingers directed my eyes to the freckled boy who had spoken before.

“Kyle,” the Asian boy said, introducing himself. The children fell silent then, their absence of noise using the last of the children to say their name. Their lips remained closed. They drifted back and forth, balancing their weight from one foot to another while focusing on the dirt of the ground.

“Its your turn!” Meredith said, letting go of my hand to pat the back of her shy female companion.

“Its not important.” She argued with her friend.

“It is too!” Meredith fought back.

“My story would still be the same under any different name.” She spat.

“Yes, yes! I know!” the feisty leader of the group cried, her hair bouncing with the wrath of her voice as she did so. “But I’ve already told you, it just makes things easier on them if we do it this way.” They glared at one another for several minutes before she caved.

“Fine, if you must know they call me ‘Caroline’, but that won’t change who I am! I hate my name, its hideous.” She wept.

“Well… if it doesn’t change who you are then why does the extent of its beauty matter?” I questioned her. “Maybe… it’s the other way around from how you think it is. Perhaps your soul chose your name and you need to learn to see it as something lovely if you are to ever see your essence as beautiful.” I caught her off guard. Her mouth hung open with the weight of no answer.

“I like him,” she then said to the group of her youthful companions. “I want to go first.” She decided.

“Go ahead,” Meredith smiled.

“My name is Caroline, like you already know.” She said, sitting down on the edge of the sidewalk and motioning for me to follow.

The other children sat with us, one at my free side, filling its loneliness, two at my feet as my lap was filled with the body of Kyle.

“Please tell me your story Caroline,” I asked politely. “I’d love to hear it” I said honestly, curious to know what these children were meant to teach me.

“Its not really a story of my past, but more of a story of my future.” She started in her explanation. “I’m going to tell you my future, who I am going to become. This isn’t my fate, there’s no such thing as fate, we are the sole forces responsible for the outcome of our lives. I’m going to instead tell you who I am going to be after I’ve written the poem of my life, made the decisions I’ll have to and become who I let myself be. Remember, we aren’t real so this isn’t contradicting itself or breaking any of the rules. We’re just assuming that this is who I am going to be say, thirty years from now when I’ve almost hit forty.” She reasoned breathlessly. Her words were quick, but understood fully in my head.

“Lets hear it then.” I decided. I urged.

“I’m going to be a good student, actually, let me rephrase that, I’m going to be a great student- the top in my class.” She bragged and the other children rolled their eyes. “Then I’ll go off to college and become a doctor, focusing in female reproduction cancer. I’ll save thousands of lives, forever being remembered in history for my work. I’ll never get married though. Every man I begin a relationship with will get sick of being with a workaholic. My passion for my profession will drive them away. The very thing that makes me so great, that intrigues my partner so much will slowly make him bitter towards me. I’ll secretly want children more then anything in the world, even more then my job, but I’ll never be able to have them because I’m too afraid to have them as a single mother. I’ll be thought of as an independent woman, but really I’ll be dependent on others to guide me and reassure me that I am able to do what I already know I can do.

“I’ll become terribly sad from all of this and be put on anti-depressants. Those won’t work though; nothing will because my depression won’t be biologically imbedded in my genes, it’s all in my head. So to escape it I’ll start to drink every night as I fall asleep in a lonely bed. Then, as the days pass I’ll need to drink more. I’ll go from drinking before I go to sleep to drinking straight when I get home from work. Then, eventually I’ll start drinking before going to work. My addiction will make me bad at my job, and I’ll make a mistake that ends in a multi-million dollar lawsuit and the end of my employment. Once I’ve lost my job I’ll loose the respect of my friends and colleagues, everyone I’m close to in life.

“Once I’ve lost everything I’ll decide I have nothing left to lose and do what I’ve always secretly been more passionate about- writing. I’ll write poetry and short stories for many years, but my work will never be appreciated, everywhere I submit my work to for publication will reject me. Then one day I’ll write a novel in three days that will change the world. It will be accepted for publication and one week before the books are printed and sold in stores I’ll be hit by a car and killed. The editor of the publishing company still prints my book, but only because of the financial investment he has made. He will not want to not print it at all because I won’t be alive to promote it. My story will become famous, a tale read by almost every soul. It will be sold-out and reprinted many times. The money will all go to a charity focusing on cancer and as my soul sits, watching this after being reunited with its source, I’ll smile and think I had the best damn life worth living.”

            She finished and my heart stopped with the tale of her death. So much struggle, so many ups and downs and yet she still sat here excited about the future. She still longed to live her life despite the problems she would face, despite the ending that would part her from these lands. It was beautiful. It touched me. I opened my mouth to tell her this but I couldn’t speak, the children wouldn’t let me talk until each was finished with their tale.

            “My turn!” Kyle claimed. “I’m going to be a hopeless romantic, the kind you only see in movies, the kind they say doesn’t exist in this world anymore. Unfortunately, I will also not be very good looking. Not hideous, just very plain. I’ll be a poet, a successful one from the start of my career. I’ll publish my first book of poetry in five years while I’m in high school. Then, I’ll drop out of school to travel the world and feel every emotion that exists, all sought out in the hope of them igniting the fire of a poem’s words. I will never be as rich, or as famous as Caroline.” He teased, elbowing her gently in the ribs. She smiled back at him, pleased with who she would become. “But my poetry will be very influential to the people who read it. I’ll fall in love with a beautiful, rich woman who others think of as naïve, self-absorbed and lazy.  I’ll find the beauty in her and when I do and I tell her what I think of her she will fall in love with me because no one has ever seen her in that light. I’ll make her see how beautiful her soul is, I’ll teach her how the face we wear is not nearly as precious as the essence beneath it.”

            “This is my favorite one,” Meredith whispered only loud enough for me to hear. I nodded.

            “We’ll get married and have a wonderful family. We’ll travel all over the world with our children until we come to the shores of South Africa and realize that here we have never felt more at home. Our house will look over the wild pacific sea and our back yard will lead into a jungle of plains. I’ll never stop writing; I’ll never stop being inspired. When things have been so perfect for so long though, they’ll fall apart. My wife will be diagnosed with ovarian cancer. We’ll take her to a doctor back home, but this doctor will have a drinking problem that we are unaware of. While under the influence one day she will make a mistake that eventually kills my wife and leaves me alone with three children to raise. I’ll go on though, never being with another woman and loving my children endlessly. I’ll cry often, lonely and stuck in the rain of sorrow, but I’ll go on, beating my boat against the currents of life.”

            The children remained silent for some time after his story. I understood why Meredith loved his story above all the others, though I had yet to hear to hear their bearers unravel the plots. The light of faith that shone from this child could light the darkest hour of night. His face was composed of the least aesthetically pleasing features of the group, but his faith made him beautiful, gorgeous. For the first time in my life I understood how important faith was and how without it we would be nothing. Faith was blood in draining veins, faith was breath in flat lungs, faith was a sunrise.

            “I guess its my turn.” Meredith whispered, bringing me from my thoughts. “I’m going to grow up to be beautiful. People will be envious of me, they’ll think it’s unfair for a person to be so beautiful and so rich. However, their jealously will cause them to hate me, to despise me, to try and bring me down. It’ll work, their insults will make me believe I’m not a good person, and so a part of me will slowly start to become the person they try to convince I am, but it will never really be me.

            Really, I’ll be a loving, warm person who cares so much about others. I’ll secretly do charity work and take in less fortunate others into my home to fill the vastness of my lonely apartment. I’ll rescue those who need to be saved; I’ll be a rope they can climb from the holes of darkness. I’ll be lonely though, longing for a companion. Many men will pursue me, however I’ll never stay with them for very long because I feel I cannot show them who I really am. I’ll slowly start to forget who I am, but then I’ll meet a man who reminds me of who that person is- the person I was meant to be. He will make me believe that I am beautiful, inside and out. He will be everything I’ve ever wanted though he won’t be very good looking.

            He will make all of my dreams come true. We’ll have children who glow stronger then the sun, we’ll travel every country we long to see. We’ll settle down one day in a foreign country, resting in a house that over-looks the sea. I’ll be so, so happy, but somewhere in the back of my head I’ll know that it cannot last forever; and it won’t, I’ll get cancer and die. The light of my eyes will flicker and grow dim until their fire is extinguished. I’ll leave my husband and my children to suffer the pain of my absence. While dying, I’ll think that I have never accomplished anything great in my life. I’ll feel sad at the thought of my death because I was dying before I had figured out what life is, before I had done anything that was important to me. I thought I was leaving with a thousand dreams unreached. Then the day before I pass, upon my final breaths, my last beats, I’ll come to realize that I accomplished the greatest thing possible- I had found out who I am, and I had embraced it fully. I was once afraid to let the world hear my song, but I had eventually found the strength to sing as loudly as my throat could cry. I’ll die in the arms of my children and the love of my life while wearing a sweet smile on my face. I’ll tell them that it will all be ok, that I had lived enough years to let me part happily. My last words will be- ‘I am so proud of you, all of you. You are such beautiful people, hearts filled with so much passion. Never hold back who you are, it has too much to offer the world. You each have the means of making it a better place, and you will. So let your souls sing, fill the silence in this world with your music, give me a song to hear from heaven.”

            Her story ended and my mind changed, it was my favorite. No, I contradicted my decision in my head, the first one was just as beautiful. They were all so… radiant, so touching, composed of so many lessons. Their stories were… life. Yes, that was it. Anne had told me that I did not know what life was, well this was it. Life was a series of struggle, a constant set of obstacles presented to one. However, it was also filled with beauty, every second that composed it could be spent dressed in smile. Every beat of silence could be spent in one turning to the music of their thoughts, to one listening to their song. Shades were meant to exist. White and black alone could not compose a picture; one needed both of them to create a masterpiece. It did not matter which shades drew the art on the canvas, what mattered was what images were drawn. My heart was overcome with the understanding and acceptance. My lesson had not been completely learned though, there was still more to hear, or at least I thought.

            “You understand now, don’t you?” Meredith stated, eyes twinkling with my heart.

            “I do.” I nodded. My hands rose to whip the tears that begun to glisten from my eyes, but then I kept them down, these tears were all a part of what I was experiencing, a part of life.

            “Then you’re finished.” She told me proudly.

            “But- I have two left to hear I”-

            “No.” she cut me off patiently. “You have nothing left to hear. We’re not here to ramble on; we’re here to help you understand. It would be a waste of time, both ours and yours, if you stayed and listened to the rest of the stories when you’re ready to move on. It’s time to go on, to move forward, to grow. Accept that this is the end of our encounter. I know this thought saddens you, but you need to learn acceptance because there are going to be much worse things that you will face. So, goodbye.” She told me stubbornly.

            Kyle rose from my lap, embracing me before stepping back and tilting his head back. He rose his arms and they gracefully caught a red ball that fell from the sky. The children and I rose, each one hugging me farewell until at there were none left to enfold. I watched them turn and run ahead of me to play a game in the streets with their ball. Once they turned they never looked back. I observed the back of their heads for some time, until I began to shiver from nights coming winds. Finally I sighed and turned to face the cats that had watched the recollection patiently, lying together on the sidewalk grooming one another. As I faced them they broke from their hygienic ritual and rose. Their eyes asked me what my next move would be and I proudly announced to them that I knew what it was.

            “I’ve learned a lot today.” I told them. The purred in agreement, fur glistening with the rise of the moon. “I’d like to go back home now.” I said, laughing as their soft calls of happiness turned to angry hiss.

            “I could go on and keep remembering the dreams,” I explained, “but I miss myself. I’d like to spend sometime with that person before we go on. I understand life now, what is it and how to face it. So… for the first time ever, I feel like I’m finally ready to decide what I want to face on this road, I’m going to decide what I want to spend my life doing. In order to know this, I need to figure out who I am- because only then can I decide where I’m going.”

            I didn’t watch the cats to observe their reaction. It didn’t matter to me. They could try to tell me to do otherwise, but I knew that this was what I needed right now. The dream was not something that could be remembered in one setting, there was a time for the recollection of each fragment. Not undergoing each in the right moment would only result in it not being fully experienced, not being fully learned. I instead chose to watch the sky, to stare at the moonrise. I had always associated the coming of night with darkness, sadness, and a time of loneliness. However, now as my eyes softly gazed the wild moon’s rays I noticed how vivid they were. They were the embodiment of peace. The Earth was quiet in a musical way. The city sidewalks were not being paced, the streets not being driven upon. While everyone was setting into their bed to sleep with the sun I stood on the street listening to the sounds that could not be heard over the song of day. I could finally hear the winds call as its breath lightly caressed my skin. At last I was aware of the cry of stray beasts as they hunted their dinner; lost dogs, wandering cats all just like me, creatures of the night.

The most striking of all though, was how in the dead silence of the night I could hear a faint tune of which I had never heard. I was not sure of where it came from, but I had an idea. I breathed with a hopeful hunch of its origins. The beats of the tune mirrored the movement of my heart as it danced against my core. The lyrics that rolled with the song reflected the thoughts gliding in my mind. The passion in which it was sung drew images of Anne’s luscious face as the sight tingled my skin with pleasure. I could not be sure, but I felt warm from the growing fire of faith that this was the song I had been seeking, the song that was the answer to all of my questions, the song that could tell me what I sought in life; what I above all desired. This song could tell me what I was and who I was. You see, in that moment as I stood strongly underneath the sublime moonlight, bones built of courage, fear drained like water from my eyes, I believed that the faint music I heard was… my song. I suspected I was finally listening to the song of myself, and I had never heard anything sound so sweet and soothing.