by: m. gantee

They are here.  They are all here.  All of them.  Here.  And when I go about the work of cleaning up, sweeping the kitchen, mopping the bathroom, I forget that they are here.  I sweep, move a chair, sweep some more.  I mop.  From this wall to that wall, across the wingspan of my arms, I mop.  (That is a strange way to put it: across the wingspan of my arms.  Stranger still to think about the wingspan of a week, a week’s worth of scurrying feet, morning shower drippings, afternoon dross brought in from the driveway, entryway, etc.)  I sweep and I mop.  The repetition of those acts is not meant to convey that I endlessly sweep and mop – rather, those acts are just signifiers of the things that are endless: the course of days and weeks and the rising and setting of suns and all of the small movements that happen between dawn and dusk and sometimes past dusk.

I forget that they are here and so I talk to myself.  And, when ideas are strong, I debate my own notions, countermand the weedling ideas that grow up through the cracks in my own logic.

Yesterday, I spent the day cleaning the brickwork around the shed.  Chutes of grass and thistle have come up, seeking the sun.  I grabbed at the base, pulling this way and that until the slender roots let go of the ground from which they had been birthed.  And then, green plant above and pale root below, I would admire the work of my perseverence, and toss the thing into the thick, uncut grass of the lawn itself.  It will lie there for the next several days, touched by sun and dew and grow narrow and thin as its nutrients expire into the wind and it becomes a withered memory of what it was.

I forget that they are here as I talk to myself and debate the things that I could become (but will not allow myself to become).  And when I remember that they are here, I quiet my voice.  I am suddenly self-conscious, aware of my tone and my prejudices.  But, as they go about their day, I remember that I am fickle as the wind.  I, too, will pass.  And there is still the kitchen to sweep today, the broom whispering more firmly of its own desires than I of mine.