proximity to memory

Encapsulated within the thinnest membranes, fragile layers of memory, of emotion, so close to where we stand.

The proximity to memory: the indeterminate distance to our past. A child's hands outstretched in time, grasping the shapes of light. Light, coloring in the walls of a familiar hallway, consuming its length, its form.

The exact length of our hands outstretched, divided by floors measured by uneven ceramic tiles. Tiles molded from the softest clay, the changing patterns of a pixelled past. That it was once a part of us. That it is still a part of us. We are mere parts and processes, pulled passages from children's fables, underlined by touch, by voice, reciting syllables instead of words, sounds so close to song.

To remember: the circuitous path to an alternate route. Unbroken lines that lead us home. Homes housed only in dreams, waxy, colored lines that outline the forms of dwelling. And we are colored in through sleep. We dream back to who we are in times past. We are defined by the amorphous shapes of a scribble-coded language, numbered shapes that we forgot to color in, again. We are unfinished coloring book ending. We are prince and princess, awaiting a child's reinterpretation of reality's biased color scheme. We are hands that cannot stay within the allotted space of predefined figurines. We are torn pages of mismanaged markers.