gate e6.

Miami airport. 9:55 pm. E6. Two waiting passengers before me. Both with elbow down, head in novel, back to plane. Wonder what makes them like their chosen author. Would they ever like me? How far am I from where I need to be? And the hope—how much of it do I need? I hate leaving this city. I always have, I always will. Jaw tightens, signs of stress, always, just hours before the day I go. I say I hate my coming and leaving, but I still do it, courageous and upon will of whim. The need to travel, to take off, to leave other realities behind and fall off terminals in front of new faces. To remind myself how easily one can move, be moved, be taken through time and deposited into a scene that has been moving without you. Acknowledging that I am not the main character, even though this life is mine. Before every flight, I kiss a man goodbye, hold his waist, then go. I wonder whether this is what makes my chest cave in. Whether I do these small acts of exaggerated crime purposefully. Lip to lip to keep me coming back home. I think it is or else maybe I would never wish to come. Desire motivates. A power we influence, just as often as it influences us. The language of desire: to be revealed, slowly, casually captured. Exposure, development in the darkroom—not unlike photography, desire is art—to be seen through. The Desire to be in Other. My mind has a mouth, gaping hole, open, hungry for meaning. But others will not let themselves think twice about what I may choose to turn on its head. This is hard. I wish I could let myself catch and release easily, always. A passivity of involvement. But as unreal as it may sound, I don’t truly want this for I need to grab hold, to grip, to see the marks, and how the pressing of one thing on to another changes the shape of self. Are creators just a fancy name—or rather respectable name—for manipulators? Needing to kneed, effectuality. Is it not the intimacy that drives the body, the mind, the heart—whatever you want to call it—but effectuality that pushes us into each other, marking each other up? Group three, boarding, time to leave and be elsewhere.