the Eye

Noemi takes my face into her hands. She gazes through the pitiably tragic Character of Leopold Charles and, for the briefest of Moments, into the Soul hidden behind my Self. My whole world sways, flickers, blindsided, pierced like a rumpled balloon hovering inches above the floor. In that Eternal Moment I fall from reality into mindless oblivion, adrift in Unknowing. A sudden Silence descends, so deep it overwhelms and embraces me within its tender folds like a lost child wandered home by unwitting intention. I am aware of a great tugging, of unparalleled but not unconquerable force; I am not being pulled in, but released from its soothing grasp like a mighty sigh. I step from a hurricane I had been swept up in so long that but for a meek and persistent distrust I had forgotten I was a part of it at all, had forgotten its very existence, forgotten that maybe there was something before, that there could be something after. I cascade like an avalanche, down, down, down to my knees. I am in the Eye of the Hurricane. I stand, stagger in slow motion about a torn-up circle of grass, sit, breathe like a newborn. Around me the Gale proceeds (I think), but it is only a sifting blur difficult to perceive with any sort of recognition, and the thought passes through my stillness with barely a ripple. I am sitting on grass, or is there grass? Perhaps there is no objectivity, only space; no fated Character, no Act One, no Intermission, no twisted Plot, no looming Finale, no Play at all, not even a Theatre, only the Audience, sitting alone amidst the darkness whispering lonely wonder.

Whispering: “Where am I?”

Whispering: “What am I?”

Whispering: “Who am I?”

Whispering: “Please.”

Whispering: “I don’t understand.”

Whispering: “I love you.”

Whispering: “Please.”

Whispering: “Love me.”

Good god. I lost my Control. I look around, startled. It's not in the grass, next to me. Did I leave my Control behind like a souvenir? lose it like a puppy? forget it like a favourite jacket? The Panic rises in me like the sun from the horizon. I blink my eyes closed and Noemi’s eyes blink open before me. She is watching me, patient. I retreat, limping, tottering on the tips of my toes, falling, regaining my feet, stumbling onwards, back turned, crazed by the glimpse of my own desperate craziness. There is the hurricane, right there! sweet ignorant floating flight awaits! But though with all my will I wish my form back to it, I move not closer. I blink my eyes closed, she blinks her eyes open. How intoxicatingly fresh her eyes are! as brilliantly vibrant a green as a young blade of grass in the spring dawn. She blinks, I blink and I see them searching, wondering. Why am I running? To where?

I stagger, open my mouth to scream the Fury from my Wrath but instead I am quiet. I breathe, straighten, breathe, focus, breathe, turn.

She steps from her skiff to the shore of the island dubbed Leopold Charles. I greet her with a courteous, cold nod but she brushes by my aloof façade with a playful smile and a hug. We join hands, neither of us initiating the connection, neither accepting it; it simply happens and I am more glad of this small sharing of intimacy than I can express. We walk the curving line where me meets the tide. I listen to her light breathing, a different source of the same sound as the rhythm of the ocean’s patiently momentous inhalation and sighing stampede exhalation. I undress because she undresses and we swim out to explore the majestic life of the crystal blue waters.

I don’t want to think of open water, of the Currents. For some odd reason howling winds echo as déjà vu but that can’t be right, for the air is still. To cover my confusion I explain: “The reefs are mine only in pleasure; here we both are guests, and we must be respectful.” Eyebrow cocked, her nod tells me that she knows this law far better than I appear to. To compensate for my slip in wisdom, I lead her to one of my favourite spots.

Here dwell a school of parrot fish the colours of a waterfall rainbow, who nibble innocently on your elbows with round and curious eyes. “Those are the gypsy fish,” I say when we surface and she laughs at me and she says: “You know so little of gypsies, Leo. You see only what your eyes tell you at a glimpse. These fish are stationary buffoons, more akin to office workers than gypsies: barely curious, content with fleeting escapes from boredom, nibblers of life, hesitant. Perhaps they are poisonous, and that is why they are so colourful.” She smiles warmly. “However, I admit their perceived gaiety is infectious.”

Languidly a loop is formed by our nude, frolicking bodies. We arrive at the delta of my river, a frothing tonguing of cold fresh water. Before us my capitol spreads, towers, attracts. I help her ashore, unwilling to hide a prideful smile, enthusiastic to awe her with the Glory of Me.