I Don’t Imagine Myself

The future seems even more out of my line of sight…

Wild Chamomile, a young bee, in the sun on the back porch.

I had a conversation with a friend this week, as I have in so many moments before – profundity wrapped in calm words, stained with tears, in choked sobs, capturing the weight of it all with little more than sound and lips, and blood laced fear as it leaves the mind and enters the atmosphere.

I am so lost, we truly all are.

There was a time in which I could imagine the future, and see the glimpses that came, footsteps of toddlers padding down the stairs; the sound of laughter in backyard bbq’s, the foolish joy that comes with sharing love with someone who shares it with you… the way in which the stories we tell ourselves of the future, seem like a fairytale that is reachable, achievable – it no longer feels the case.

I cannot help but imagine, that I cannot imagine myself at all.

When I close my eyes, and think about what is to come, I can only see the images of the world that lays in destruction at my feet – the one in which children have lost their future, adults have lost their children, and we have lost our tenuous grasp on humanity.

It isn’t as though I wish it all to end, at least not in a morbid way – I don’t wish death upon myself, I imagine that I don’t think about myself at all.

I wonder what happened when I lost this ability to think of the future, and then it makes sense that I lost it about the time I lost my hope for the present – the way in which every left turn takes us right back to the place we are – the shape of our noose, a square, tightening impossibly against our throats, the last breath of humanity taking shape in a sharp gasp against chapped lips, our vocal cords raw with the ache of want. The scream for life that leaves us rasping to pull at the heartstrings of those that hear the echoes of it.

I often wonder at what the generations to come will find when they look back, and then a small, sardonic voice reminds me that I don’t imagine that there will be future generations – what they will find, will be the darkness that meets us all, as they will not exist if we in the present continue as we are.

It is, I imagine what we are fighting for – even if I don’t believe that I imagine what I will do on the other side, all I can think of is what we are doing now.

But I don’t imagine myself at all.

I cannot let the smoke in the shadowy corners of my mind take shape, they no longer have soft hips, soft skin, sharp eyes, and wild hair – they no longer have the curves of the human body in which I inhabit – rather, it is darkness, blank, void in the shape of heartbreak and what is left is an absence that I wasn’t aware could feel all-consuming in the way that nothingness can tend toward.

I used to imagine all the things that I could accomplish in my life. The books that I’d write, the art that I’d make, the children I’d love, the partner I’d cherish, the life I would craft in the margins of the story that I live with abandon, and yet – I no longer have a sight for the future, I no longer think of myself at all.

I cannot help but worry myself awake, and stress myself to sleep. Exhaustion is a friend and an enemy, and it hugs my shoulders, and grabs my chest, and chokes me in my moments in between.

I think of the eyes of those that I love, the way in which they are shades of black, brown, green, grey, blue, and all the myriad in between – I imagine what they will look like when I see them in white shrouds and the tears that blind me, leave me with a fear that holds me – I cannot imagine a future in which I am friends with anything by surrender.

Desolation becomes a word that I understand, in a way that I wish I would rather forget language altogether.

I look forward to knowing less, and being more, and letting the knowledge leave me in the space between wisdom and silence.

How I wish I could leave the scratch marks of survival on the life that I am clinging to.

The way in which we are rocketing toward an impossible end, shaped with the blood and bone of those who were seen as less than, not even collateral, not even a whisper of sadness, the way in which we watch the screens as they flitter past our fingers, our eyes no longer connecting to our souls, the heartbreak that should come masked with something graver, something far more disturbing.

Acceptance.

I cannot imagine myself. I no longer think of what is to come, because I must focus on what is here, what is now.

• I think about the way in which she smiles, and the car lights up in the dark on a Tuesday night.

• I think about the way in which he is generous in the foolish way that comes with being taught nothing else.

• I think about the way in which she welcomed me in to her home, and shared her heart in the tears that bled into the white tissue as she mourned her relationship.

• I think about the way in which when I enter a room, he smiles and my heart hitches, and I think it would be lovely to just hold him for a moment.

• I think about the way in which the tobacco smells in the Sunday morning sunlight as he lights it and passes it to me, sharing a drag while drinking black coffee and listening to the birds and the sirens of the city.

• I think of the smell of chamomile, and the sound of the bees, and the peace the river brings just outside of my grandmothers back porch.

• I think about the way I cannot help but dance when I get good news from my realtor, the way in which Alhamdulilah drips like sprinkles of joy on top of a cake made of sweet gratitude.

• I think about the Subhanallah that leaves like a moan, when I drag the hijab from my head, and bra from my chest at the end of the day.

• I think about the way I am rocketing toward a future I cannot see, and a past that feels further and further away…

And I remember that there is nothing but the now, and for now, that is all I can be present for.

I no longer think of the future, it is out of sight, and I no longer see myself in the shapes that the future no longer takes.

Yet I think of the way in which this world that I live in, has left its mark upon me. The art that marks me, the ink that is in my skin, the way in which the fabric that wraps my head is an indicator of grief and hope, and a statement of the faith that I am only but sure of.

I cannot think of the way in which my uncle would think of the way the world is, nor the place in which I take of it.

I find that I still mourn him on the death-day anniversary. The way that I don’t realize that is what I am weeping for, as the tears collapse along the fabric of my shirt, before I come to the awareness of the day – the shape of my uncle in the past looking more clear than the idea of me in the future.

I think of the way the spiders in my friends apartment are promises of protection that we’ve been taught to fear.

I think of the way that ramen tastes, when it’s pouring rain on a Wednesday night, and the sound of laughter across the table as my friend shares a moment of joy at the server that is a reminder of the beauty of the souls in the humans that we allows ourselves to perceive (if only we but allow ourselves to see.)

I think about all the ways in which this world is beautiful, and allow myself a moment to stay present. Be here. In the now. The way in which it all seems so utterly worth it, while not knowing to which I assign value – what is the name of the value that you give to the life you live?

How can you give a value to something that is both completely you, and without you, and in you, and more than you? What do you do but appreciate it, and assign your appreciation a value so much larger than the structures that we are taught to seek value in.

The stock market could never hope to aspire to the way in which I value each moment.

The capitalists couldn’t hope to understand the wealth of the very second that I live, the way in which each second makes up a minute and in that hour that passes, I find myself impossibly rich.

The value of gratitude, as it is a present that some wouldn’t be able to unwrap, unable to unravel their own greed in the shaking hands that rip the package apart before appreciating the gift at all.

I cannot imagine myself, no longer do I think of the future, I can only allow myself to see the now, and allow the red strings on my board to tie themselves in knots – I no longer see the future for something we should aim for.

I see the now as something we should fight for.

I am no longer able to see the shape of me in the future.

I see however, all the people in my life that make the present worth bleeding for.

I see however, all the ways in which the now, is so much more important.

For if I fight for the present, then those that come, can rest.

I may never see the future, but I am here in the now, and I am obligated to the gratitude that comes with knowing that I may not know what comes when I leave this coffee shop, but right now I am grateful for the scent of coffee, the sunlight streaming in the through the window, the perfume that the woman at the table across from me is wearing, the text that came through from my friend, the music playing in my ears, and the way in which this… is exactly what I am fighting for.

May I continue to see myself in the present, and allow the future to take the shape it will.

I may no longer be able to see myself in it– but I am living in the present, and I’ll be damned if I forget to fight for the now, in the searching for something better to come.

x o x o - Jacks