Ask for it. Demand it. Insist.

Sometimes I think about what would have happened if as a child I ran with scissors. Or crossed my eyes too long. Or ate with my mouth open.

Or stared at the Sun, something I still struggle with. It's no small task to not stare at the Sun. Ask any beauty addict. It's like asking a sunflower to break eye contact with its staring partner, to blink in defiance of that which gives it life. To turn a solar petal away from heat and light. To deny the proper rhythm. Sunflowers take a nightly bow, thanking the heavens not just for the attention but for giving it a reason to get a good night's rest.

So it can do it all over again.

We are penitent sunflowers saying daily grace.

My other thoughts are of shadows, of their formation, of how they writhe against the edges of sight, how they cool the spot beneath a tree, how they define space we aren't sure what to do with, how between the fingers of lovers they stop existing, how they are cast and re-cast, how beautiful they are not just because but because they highlight light.

Paintings need frames.

I think of seeking minds in seeking light, a room of angles and attributes defined by shadows made by intertwining limbs. The deepest are under small tables when knees and hands interact in unseen ways. Warmth can be shared from one capillary to the next, a place where there are no shadows.

Warmth is sought. Heat. Intensity. The burning Sun.

I live the life of a fool unbound.

I'm uhinged. I drag my feet, finally. I've learned enough wisdom to be selfish. I've quit caring.

Peace is blurry perception and the ignorance not to care.

Problem is I was born with perfect vision. I was born with perfect care. I was born with radar, with an air-traffic control tower, fully-staffed, not just with the best blip-readers but the rookies and apprenticeses and the temps and the paranoid schizos who warn of vectors like wise men warn of wind. Problem is... I'm tuned in.

I'm well-trained to notice the little things. I hate the little things. I use the word hate only in the most specific of ways.

I cherish. I cherish deep and shallow shades of grey. I cherish the potential of Man. Even better is the potential of Woman. Her crinkle, her squint. Her longing to wrangle knowing embraces. I cherish the mind of the woman that finds this sentence simple. Her eyes locked, her pretty blues speaking volumes in silence...

She's a soft wind, a ponderous minx, a steady section of gravity. She's irreparable, she's a beehive, she's a wasp nest, she's perfect.

She begs for answers more than me. But she seeks... she always seeks...