Time

Time passed me by in both directions as the cart came to an abrupt stop in the tunnel. It didn’t affect you, as though your presence were independent of it entirely. Though maybe it was, and maybe you weren’t really driving after all.

I had asked you to brake before we reached the entrance, aware that we shouldn’t cross over to the inside, but you chose not to heed my pleas. But if you weren’t really the driver, to whom did I appeal?

Maybe you were never there all along, and it was I who did not listen to myself. Thresholds are thin, and desires are strong, and often overriding. When the dream becomes reality and the past fades, it is often difficult to distinguish the two.

If time flows in both directions, what does it look like when it flows backward? We have an idea through the filters of our minds and insights into the lenses of those who came before, but where does the current take it? Or does everything that has come before form a sort of stopping force, with the purpose of holding our bodies in the present, while only filtering out some feeling?

Maybe I should have never allowed an illusion to carry me so irrevocably far from home, but here I find myself, worn by the years, and lighter than ever.