On the Wing

Soundtrack: On The Wing by Owl City

Wide-eyed, feel the slow rhythm pulse in time with your breathing. In, out, in, out, as deep as the tide and as wide as your soul. Deep blue, beating heart. Oceans fill you with the waves, even as you walked on the paved roads of the city’s center. Walk in the woods, smell the pines around you. Walk, run, and then glide over the fallen leaves, the wood loam, the sea foam, the firm and soft sands, the asphalt, the colored glass. Stand apart, look over the balcony and see beyond. Neon dreams and flashing signs neither distract nor detract, not so far down under the surface. Curl up in your apartment bed, and wake to find yourself in the mountains. Follow the soft, swelling tide all the way to the center of yourself. Reach out and stretch, never lose your starry gaze as you see past the mass of humanity that neither adds nor takes away, but simply is. Rise up, and feel the sky scrape your back as you fly. No, not fly: that is no way to describe this. You float over the earth, neither judge nor creator, but simply a watcher. See every vein in every leaf, every grain of sand, every drop in the ocean, every pane of stained glass, and yet, still take in the forest, the beach, the great, seething sea, and the cathedrals standing as sentinels against the night. The pearls that shine in the sea, deep in their protected shells, have nothing against you. They wait, watch against their time. They know they will one day leave, to grace the old arcades and grand old avenues. So too the gems in the mountains, hidden and sleeping. Float above all this, do not take part, until you are as a star in the sky to the people watching below. The words that will never echo from your mouth again sound forth in the deepest tiers of your soul. “Are you there?” Once again, become aware of the rhythm and pull of the sea, the oceans, and the moon. “Are you there?” Breathe in the sand, the pine needles, the stones of the mountains, the grains of the beach, the feathers of all the birds, the clouds in the sky, and the water on the face of the Earth. It is enough. “Or are you just a decoy dream, in my head?”

It is enough.