Ephemeral

When I look into the mirror these days, I do not see myself.

I see the days that have passed and the days to come. I see the span of an entire life, fading and flushing as the years fly by.

As though a child is ruffling through the pages, zoning in and blurring out on each image, so fast- my head spins:

You, of a naive childhood, hair in pigtails, bound in colourful ribbon and effortless smiles.

You, of the infinite masks, each one giving way to the next, like dominoes poised by loathing and pleasure.

You, of a tempered heart and fearful eyes, opening doors with questions and a hidden knife.

Shades of myself but tinged in disparate colors.

Our hearts pump to the same rhythm and yet, they bridle against the beat, as if to deny this likeness.

We are shackled into this flesh by our hatred; our disdain for the last and jealousy of the next.

I see us- in our fettered hate- standing in line, salivating with contempt.

I imagine if time were a place, we would be stacked, a bundle of photographs, each one more faded than the last.

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When I look through this mirror, I want nothing more than to reach through the glass and tell you everything you don’t want to hear.

I want to tell you of those dreams I have fulfilled with a blatant ingratitude. Of those hopes I have forgotten, carelessly, the whispered yearnings that lie discarded in some distant corner of my heart.

I want to reach through this barrier of time and tell you of your utter inconsequence in the life of our whole.

How little a difference your worrying made, how insignificant a change your obsessing bought.

I want to tell you how little distance you’ve covered for all your running, how much of our life you’d wasted.

I want to shake you until your teeth rattles, until tears tremble in your eyes.

You are the reason why I am the person I am today. You are the reason why I can’t stop running.

I want to force you to stop, for a moment, and let life pass by you. Second by second, inch by inch, I want you to feel torturously slow time tick by.

I close my eyes and I can feel it; this passage of time coursing through our veins.

And then I feel the glass pressing against my fingers, as if to protect you, defending you, and there is a burst of rage, stemming from an acute frustration.

I am fading, faster, faster, and you are still running, you don’t understand, we are fading photographs, growing lighter, lighter as we run.

I look into the mirror, light flickering on glass, and you are running, and I don’t understand why; why I can’t stop.

I want to stop, and let my life pass by me, be a spectator for a while, and you didn’t understand, just like I never do.

You; the girl in the pigtails, the one with the masks, the hidden knife; we are fading into nothingness, like the prettiest of sunsets- fading into the next, the next one, the one after, until there’s nothing left of us.

You, me, us, the ephemeral.

I want to stop, and feel the torturously slow seconds tick by, time coursing through my veins. I want to stop running, just for a while.

But you never understand.

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Photo by Thomas Kinto on Unsplash

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