Two Ships Passing In The Night (She Dreams)

The water spread out in front of me like a green velvet painting. The deck of the dock was wet and cold, with a soft mossy texture clinging to the slowly disintegrating oak floorboards of the harbor. I don’t remember the clock’s direction when I first sat down, but I knew that the sun was still waltzing with the horizon: now, the moon was playing a game of hide-and-go-seek behind a tall tree. I had simply lost my desire to stand and return to the cool dirt of the common— the rocking of the dock matched the rolling of my stomach.

My family would probably be looking for me, searching for the person that they knew so dearly. As I sat alone, however, I was as far from that person as possible. The night breeze had breathed that person in, and spit her back out. As I looked out upon the stretched ocean, I focused my vision on a boat, shining with the reflection of the green water and oil canvas sky. I began to imagine the lives of the passengers aboard the long commercial liner—without a doubt, somebody on that boat was more alone than me.

Somebody on the ship was falling in love for the first time, maybe somebody was falling out of love for the last time, I could not be certain. Solely I could imagine picturesque lives for people of whom I would never meet. They were nothing but shadows that existed from a world that I could not understand; complicated, human shadows with a life that I greatly envied. I was envious of their mobility, regardless of them moving toward home or far away, they were moving. I was sitting alone on a boat of stagnant movement anchored to a pier.

What I would give to be a shadow drifting through the water, I’m not sure. My blood can flow as fast as the waves on the river and my mouth can grip words as fast as the hull through the dark. I felt as green as the water in front of me. Sick from the waves, but more so from my desire. I ran my hands over the scenery like a paintbrush, wishing I was the artist who had created it. If I had created it, perhaps I would be alone on the free moving boat rather than alone, by myself, on the dock.