The Escape Artist Chronicles
- Part 7 By: Gayla Walther


something stirrs now, something nameless and of an emotion that i cannot decipher. i cannot name or really feel so strongly.

the woods i walked in the other night at darkness and coldness, was the place in which i could clearly think and my mouth moved without effort at making the thoughts that run around in my head flow out from my lips and into the ear of someone who heard, lacking judgement and fear and unacceptance, as we sat on the old fallen tree who cradled our bodies and made time flow and air warm.

and stars glow without the moon, and hills around surround with walls, our own place in time and space.

freedom and escape from my troubled and barely floating mind, lifted from the torrents that tell me they're home. smiling and winking and pulling me down, under to where i cannot breathe. and the hands and ears and eyes of you lifted me up into the middle of the world where it is all possible and the torrents are so far away and unreachable, i can still see, and know they're there forever. those hands...

but so are the torrents/torments.

are you a drug, clouding me, or are you real?

real like the clouds and trees and carpets and grass and broken things where i can see the faces that speak to me in a glance, without sounds or movement, who keep my lonliness company, who remind me that i am alone and that i am seen?

you, soul who knows, soul who has only seen me, are you inside? must i pull you in? are you drowning or need to be saved? how can i repay you? what name is given to a payment of safety and understanding and freeing a trapped soul? and to repayment?

you'd laugh at these words in humility and timidness, you'd laugh thinking you've done nothing, knowing that you simply want to hear and share and it's simple all to you, but for me....

i was the child who didn't fit, like trying to put the circle block in the square hole. i could be put inside but i always slipped through and was left in the search to find the right block. left to be kicked around by passers by or chewed by a dog or tossed in the garbage or left to be attempted to fit in the oval hole...

i was colored blue and i was always crying.

i cried for others, and for my temptation and flirtation with death. i prayed and then cursed for receiving no anwers. i never once asked for anything corrupt or material, i only asked for acceptance and peace in my head and to be left alone.

and now the acceptance is without worry and the peace in my head is often flowing and the aloness is beautiful and so easing, but all life around me is making the tears scream and my skin turn blue again.

is this universal balance, an exchange of some torment for another. outside, then inside. in then out. how many more times will the roles reverse? are they changing soon?, now? am i writing this because i can feel the change creeping up, because it's bad and has to creep? and if this is all so, how can i prevent the change and maintain this goodness?

how can i? when will i be able to go free, running through those fields that contain all that i need? laying in the bed smiling and playing and never having to do a thing?

why can't this life be what i can create it? without all the obvious limitations? you can name some, i can name one...money.

well now, i've found an escape...your ears and eyes and hands and mind. and you will lead to more and i will find the freedom to escape and others will see that they can escape in me...ears and hands and mind.


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