LIX

For you, my love, a story: We were born blind into a garden- of tears and molded mud and a god's scintillant breath. We were happy beyond all asking: lost in birdsong, our feet solid upon the loam, we knew nothing about the past. Which is to say, we knew nothing about the future. We had no knowledge of our coming death, for instance, that the earth composing us would someday claim us, crumbling our edges down till we could no longer feel ourselves in the obstensible world. But something happened. We found our way to water. Stumbling hand in hand we followed burbling sounds to the spring at the end of a prickly hedge. We bent down and washed the mud off our eyes, and saw. We did not care that we were naked and hungry, for the garden that embraced us was more beautiful than we had ever dreamed.

-- J. Neil Garcia --