The One I Lived

　　I live after my death day by day, and I am strong

　　Welcome to the windows

　　of God`s living room.

　　It will only take a moment,

　　or many millions, but

　　Earth`s long years grow small

　　here. I see you came with a camera

　　slung around your neck.

　　Let`s print all that living.

　　It was given to me sometime between

　　birth and the before. It steals memories

　　with burglar precision. It takes shots from fifty,

　　a thousand yards, and it never misses. Even If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

　　when I screw my eyes shut and shove my palms

　　over the glass eye, it ruptures through skin and shame.

　　The sleek black box records not only the words I say, but

　　the words I`ve felt skidding past me like bristled

　　asphalt, broken concrete teeth bared. The words

　　I`ve whipped out like lashes in my mind, too afraid

　　to let them loose on their intended target, a bitter

　　rope to swallow. It even captivates and ensnares

　　the emotions, mine and others. A camera of sorts

　　that captures smell and feel and feelings.

　　The ugliest of things, burrowed in myself

　　and others. The sacred memories carefully hidden

　　away like a childhood stuffed bear or blanket, tattered

　　from being fingered and clutched in darkness. Film

　　that never runs dry, memory that never sinks

　　with the weight of the parading years.

　　And he prints them, every shot, the good and the bad and the hard and the soft and the sharp and the dull and the new and the old and the kiss and the ache. Handing me a stack, we stick them to the window glass, blocking out God`s own personal garden. I start by looking through the images—the sunflowers all face towards us from the green outside. But as we create our own kind of movie, novel or play, he begins to ask about the teacher, the fireflies in a jar under the bed, the slap across my face and my raw pride, the diapers and cakes with numbered candles and funeral potatoes, brought and received. I find myself laughing, crying, hiding my face in shame, joking, storytelling, explaining, questioning, conjecturing, understanding. I find myself in the images, this collage heavy with life in a room of living. He listens like the mountains who hear the Earth shifting around their proud peaks for the years of the planet`s spinning existence. No one has listened to me for so long—not even myself.

　　I saw my life flash before my eyes.