And I Know It When I Do

Emmylou Harris: Tulsa Queen

So that’s how we live our lives.
No matter how deep and fatal the loss,
no matter how important the thing that's stolen from us -
that's snatched right out of our hands -
even if we are left completely changed,
with only the outer layer of skin from before,
we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence.
We draw ever nearer to the end of our allotted span of time,
bidding it farewell as it trails off behind.
Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday.
Leaving behind a feeling of insurmountable emptiness...
Maybe, in some distant place, everything is already, quietly, lost.
Or at least there exists a silent place where everything can disappear,
melting together in a single, overlapping figure.
And as we live our lives we discover -
drawing toward us the thin threads attached to each -
what has been lost. I closed my eyes and tried to bring to mind
as many beautiful lost things as I could.
Drawing them closer, holding on to them.
Knowing all the while that their lives are fleeting.
--Haruki Murakami
Sputnik Sweetheart