God knows why I’m back here, living this life I’m living. I’m caught up. I can’t move, can’t plan for what’s next. I stutter through the days on caffeine and too much nicotine, try to spread the world out on the floor so I can get a bird’s eye view of all that’s going on, but my scope isn’t broad enough, will never be broad enough. But when I hitch something, some craggy part of the rock, I go forever. I write through till sunrise and the bleary buzz that accompanies a night of no sleep.
The hitch usually comes when I’ve exhausted myself. It must be a certain state of insanity that turns me into a whirlwind.
You get into a rhythm. You maintain it with coffee and cigarettes, with clips to keep your hair out of your face, with sweaters so you don’t get too cold and a fan so you don’t get too warm. You follow it into the grocery store, onto the bus, chase it down your street. You search frantically for it when it goes hiding for a few seconds, because fuck, the last time it came to you was seven months ago and who knows when it will be back next time.
You keep your hands at the keyboard in case they want to put more words together.
You take your cues, you watch for signs, you hold your breath. You try not to get your hopes up.
Now… if you’ll just create a reality in which you’re recognized in your lifetime for brilliant, evocative prose, rather than a gray post-mortem fog future in which someone discovers all of this shortly after you’ve assumed room temperature and willed the literary rights to some dreadful snot-nosed little niece with a disgusting fondness for things Gucci and a vague memory of Aunt Ariel as the wacky woman who wrote things down and stared at clouds… you’ll be kicking some ass, sister.
Literarily speaking, that is.