i've been waiting for longer, for more years than you, to be at this place. we've been reformatting memory, down the streets of the city i no longer live in, and through its alleyways, and it is the end of a night of that, up against the bins. i've waiting for longer, to be able to do that, to breathe into the nightime dreary settings, to turn around and walk backwards through evening. and even through that, even against it, i have to sit down sometimes, and hold my head in my hands like the weeper does. i have to sit down and remember, remember all of the things that make their own circles on my hands, all of the jars of life i am holding. i have to sit down, and taste things, remember to taste them, in the way that i used to, so that they play with my tongue, so we can dance. sometimes time is a map or a reason. and sometimes, like tonight, it is just the way the curtain pulls in and outwards, moves with the air and the way that it doesn't seem to be moving.