Kinetic

I know it has happened before I've even opened my eyes. There's a hum in the air, a buzz near my temples, there's a smile on my lips that stretches with the late morning sunlight. Spring has arrived.

The day is warm, warmer than it should be; I don't care, it is perfect. I run sweating to connecting trains, land in a quiet garden with cherry trees still sleeping, watch the brown earth lie still in anticipation. The entrance is pompous later in the year, built for show, I know its tricks, this is not why I'm here. Wander down a small path on the side, arrive at undulating lawns and steady tree trunks. There, hesitant at first, one by one little flowers appear, before spreading into a sea of color. Waves of purple crocus, little fireworks of aconite and snowdrops, soft rounds of hellebore, it's all I can do to keep from throwing myself in their midst and going for a swim. The sun breaks out, birds go wild, when I cannot help but smile, people cannot help but smile in return, it is a dream, only because we know it is real.

I sat on a bench later, basking in the sunlight, watching children play among the flowers, and thought, I survived, and realized in that instant it was true. It's over now, all the death and destruction and hollow weight inside my inert body, it is over. It is time to dust myself off, pick up all the pieces that were left waiting, an entire life of beauty and truth and strength in the making, they are all still here. A tattered book sits at the top of my backpack, whispers of the road and the world and all the madness I have yet to discover, and after months of feeling nothing but illiterate, I look at it now and think yes, I'm coming, and know that it is true.