DatingJosh

This evening the heat broke in St. Louis and a comfortable breeze swirled through the streets. I sat outside, enjoying the cool, peaceful evening and watched the sun set, gracefully sliding below the thick stand of trees on the edge of Forest Park. As the setting sun painted the low-slung, diaphanous clouds deep orange and violet I reflected, yet again, on the recent absurdity that has become my life. There are no solutions, merely recriminations. My feet remained firmly rooted to the rough-hewn stone beneath, unmoved by the desperate cries of my heart to run to her, run until my breath gives out and my legs fail; to fly to her, wide-eyed and delirious, seeking respite, nepenthe, peace. I silently screamed at the stone beneath my feet, yet the obdurate stone was unmoved.

So I arose, cast one last gaze toward the west and, as the last liquid vestiges of sunset glimmered in the foliage, I held my head up and slowly began my walk home knowing that, as always, my eyes would be drawn, as of their own accord, up the street toward where she lives; the evening’s final, unconscious expression of hope.