Time-Machine

If you are reading this I want you to be aware of the lives you are touching this moment. And the lives you are being touched by right now. Just by existing. Breathe in. Breathe out. You are leaving finger prints all over the place. Delicate translucent webs of your highly concentrated essence. Replaced every minute by someone else. Each a different substance. A different memory. 

You.
Falling out of love. Over-dozing on caffeine. Laughing at the joke you didn't quite catch. Keeping your blanket close for five extra minutes on winter mornings heavy with longing.

You.
Vomit on your sweater. Shifting uncomfortably in a room full of people you don’t know. Thinking of the foliage from the last fall carefully preserved between the pages of your journal. The butterflies in mason jars. Distant scent of mildew in the otherwise fresh air brushing past as you run. Stopping a while later. Bending on your knees . Heaving. Catching breath.

You.
With your lips. Raw. Eager. Slightly parted. Tracing the hollow between her neck and collarbone. That piece of flesh you've always wanted. Her cold fingertips composing random patterns of yearning at the back of your neck. The soft signs closing the space in-between.

You.
Conscious and clumsy. Hiding your face. Marks of anger running down your arms. Making pretty pictures. Listening. Being told that you are what is wrong with the world. Reading. Creating. Feeling infinite.

You.
Separated by exactly six degrees from another person. A door. An opening to the world beyond. Just five acquaintances away. Absorb the thought. The endless possibilities of it.

You.
The walking evidence of constant evolution. Sixteen percent Carbon. Twenty three pairs of chromosomes. Ten pints of blood. A DNA like no other and yet bound closely with the common fear of falling.
You never quite fear the heights, you now realize. But, the fall.

You have left an impression. On me. On us.