Correspondence 5

Slow, Frederick, my breath extended, my chest rising, and along this hazy day, I watched as the clouded sky sighed, as I might, as if knowing that its current plans are going to be washed away; not much unlike the branches, tree limbs, and full tree bodies down Route 15! The wind scuttled, Frederick, and the branches fingers scratched at window panes, they too, whispering, Scuttle, Scuttle, Scuttle. And what of those wooden framed windows, on their track with painted thick rope pieces, only able to be risen or lowered if both sides are exactly parallel to each other; what of those Frederick, rickety, rickety shaken by the winds massive hands, the knuckles white where they gripped tight the window sides. Behind them, Frederick, the reckoning of the mind, subtle slowness encapsulating, and vertical and horizontal motions cease. Beyond those Windows it's Monday, I think , you say Tuesday, along the main street, we walking, you to the left of where you walked, to the right of the street, stepping through and occasionally on those cracks, me flinching each time you missed stride and the soles of your worn boots straddled those industrial built sidewalk slabs. Occasionally, as if on some miniature level, the sidewalk having split and one side of the crack risen, as I imagine the world might in some giant earth tremor, your shoes try to bridge that giant fissure, and focus your balance from the heel to the ball of your foot. Even in these moments, I flinch with the thought of yet another back being broken. But I muddy the mental waters, and sail from my point, as it was here Frederick, as the winds faded between the brick behemoths on either side of us, and the gust having risen up, and then as if in the rise, the wind regained it's strength and scoured back towards the minute openings in our jackets, the spaces between wrist and jacket cuff; our neck and jacket collar, and invaded the last few spaces of warmth for the rise of hair in these follicles their reach extending to some imaginary warm space in the vacuum of their undeveloped minds. You spoke words that entered the world as smoke, lifted twirled in a very unrehearsed waltz with that same wind, and the word, Goodnight entered into existence, stricken to the record, as a scream, and I yell back, the heat of my words as jet stream towards yours, and we battle for the nights attention! It's midday and dreary, most certainly not night, even on this the first long day of the year, this dreary Monday, although it seemed Tuesday to you , but dreary doesn't cut it, you say, as you would, hanging on the limbs of that white knuckled wind; and I, vanquished, retreat, each word doesn't cut it, I mumble. So moving on, together once and against the pale gray street, flooded with shop windows dimly lit I sit!