that's mrs. mediocrity to you

Five days in, and this has been February. And all the stories I tell myself, all the excuses and plans and promises refuse to rise to the surface. I tell myself that it’s okay. That it’s always this way in this month, that it’s lack of sunshine, or fresh air, or freedom.

Silence. I surround myself with silence and I listen.

I hear whispers and promises, but not the words I crave. Patience becomes the antidote, and I work and fill the air with other people’s stories: radio, television, novels. Always a backdrop of sentence and syllable, and I wonder if I’m learning something useful, or filling my mind with capricious clutter. Or if it even matters.

I walk outside at night and search the sky, which these days, is always falling.

I feel tiny and insignificant, endless and universal. A snowflake lands on my palm and disappears before I can taste it. My tongue is empty and my skin is burning. Some nights, I don’t even wear a coat.

The dog stands still and looks into the woods, wishing for something to be there.

Me, too, I say. Me too.

Inside there’s a fire to sit beside, always the primordial companion.

There are no wolves to howl, but the coyotes are always laughing. My skin crawls at their sound, even as my lips curl into smile.

Their cause is survival, their joke life’s refrain.

Me, too, I say. Me too.

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