Via Negativa

When the gladiator starts walking 
wordlessly into the pale horizon, hands 
trailing in knee-deep grass, you know 
this is movie shorthand for oh shit 
he's dead and his soul is on the way 
to the afterlife. My poet friend
messages me to say we are or should be
writing just for the sheer joy of creation 
and being in conversation with the dead—
I agree one hundred percent. In that the world
constantly, intensely,  makes us aware of our 
own mortality, I guess you could say we are also
always in conversation with ourselves. These 
are sober conversations, but sometimes 
they can be ridiculous or foolish. Am I,
are you, most alive in words; or when,
at the height of pleasurably licking
the $5 tamarind popsicle at the farmers
market, the tangy sweet plops onto the hot
pavement in front of you? So sad, to lose
what you thought was safely in your grip.
Most everyone I ask about whether they
would live their whole lives over again exactly
the same way if given another chance say
yes, they would. Because if you touched
even one thread, one hair, it would no longer
be your life. Perhaps you'd be rid of all
the mediocre jobs and failed relationships, 
but you'd no longer even be with the people
you know and love right now. And so I try 
to sit in this field without panicking about 
my dwindling years. Late afternoon light 
gashes the tips of marsh grass, and I
try to forgive myself all the wrong 
turns and missed connections.

At the end of a long day at work, I feel 
as if I could fall asleep on my feet, drop 
like a rock on the couch or plant my face 
on my dinner plate. How much more 
for those who are the third shift, the ones 
who pull all-nighters—nurses, road construction 
workers, practically everyone in a service position? 
Sure, now we know that certain animals can go 
for long periods of time without sleep. Has anyone 
asked if they are therefore perennially exhausted, 
and what they do to alleviate that? Dolphins
and great frigatebirds experience 
unihemispheric sleep—which means half 
their brain stays awake at all times while 
the other rests, so they are never
completely unconscious. The common
swift, only seven inches long, has a small, 
pale bib under its chin and a wingspan of nearly
sixteen inches. As the days shorten, it begins
its intercontinental migration, staying airborne 
for ten whole months without stopping. 
The half of my brain that's still awake can't
even comprehend how that's possible. 
And when I'm really tired, it's like half my brain 
really wants to fall asleep but the other half 
is still cycling furiously from one thought to another, 
worrying about how I'm going to meet my deadlines 
or when I'll ever finish paying off my mortgage;
worrying about my working daughters—if they're 
happy, have enough sleep, have enough to eat.

In time, even the meaning of time
changes, though it does not. 

I used to bristle at what I imagined
was its rough touch, its interfering.

What it withheld was never the same as
what it gave, when finally it opened its hand.

And then, sometime after the middle, 
I fevered or trembled at its approach.

I used to believe it was another name for promise,
for what endures beyond fog— Time, you do 

endure. And in some ways I do, too. Ask me 
what I've let go of, what I've let befall  me. 

My friend bought three pairs of sandals
at Nordstrom Rack, though she'd gone in
for a different item. All of them are cute—
olive and white and orange—and perfect
for the season. My other friend just bought
a house (or closed on a house) in a quiet 
neighborhood not far from a cemetery
where my husband used to take our youngest
daughter to practice driving (no fear of killing
anyone there). I bought a dress to wear 
to our nephew's wedding in the midwest—
something I haven't done in a while. It's cute
too: thin stripes on a cream background, 
but in a midi length that comes to maxi 
on my petite frame, which means I'll cut
and hem it myself; but even so, I'm
kind of excited. When I tried it on, it fit
so well; I could almost hear my mother,
who used to sew all my clothes, exclaim:
Kasla inar-aramid! By which she'd meant, 
as if bespoke. Reaching for the thing 
that made us giddy or excited, I marvel at
how none of us seemed to be consciously 
thinking of the terrible stuff in the news 
this week, even if we were—for don't we get 
reminded every nanosecond anyway? 
A nanosecond is equal to 1000 picoseconds 
or 1⁄1000 of a microsecond, also likely the speed 
at which dopamine releases into the bloodstream, 
which aids the fight or flight response but mostly 
works as part of our reward-as-pleasure system. 
The shoes are dope, the suit is dope. We do what
we need to survive but can't deny the dopamine rush— 
how good it feels to do  something pleasurable.
Already, the brain looks forward to the next hit.