one for the road

the pavement is everywhere in the city. it seems to be static- it is not a growing living thing like grass, but if you have ever lived anywhere with paved roads, you know that is not true. It expands and shrinks- crumbles and is torn apart and put back together, patched. It's the bottom- the least- the common denominator- the base of a city. It's spat on, peed on, thrown up on, spilled on, swept and cleaned and takes it all over again. The heat absorbs into the pavement and rises up, making the city waver in the light. The ice coats the pavement and turns the city to an obstacle course. it is the common, the normal, the least.

my feet pound the pavement- literally. the city's rhythm jolts up my legs and sets it's pace in my heart. i match  my breathing to the movement of my feet and even the tiny cilia in my ears tremble with the pace. my every molecule orbits with the city, around it, through it, and because of it. i am in tune; i am the city; the city is in me. the pavement is my base. my lowest denominator. and i pound it every chance i get. it pounds me back and we force each other to change, to crumble, be built back up, to be dirtied, and to be cleaned again. the pavement in summer is heat and steam. in summer, i am heat and steam. the crash and clash of our molecules weave our destinies, the push and friction propel us forward, hold us in place, and compel us to move.

sweat drips down my neck, my back, my legs. i push; it pushes back. the exertion is cleansing. i reach the lake, and realize it too is a part of me. the endless blue is in my mind, is the backdrop and the main character, the holder of my tears; it is my tears. i cry the lake. i rejoice the lake. i frolic and swim and laugh and move like the water of the lake, in the lake. but i am also afraid of the lake- it's depths, being consumed by it all at once, what may lurk underneath. as i ran tonight, i had this thought- how can i be afraid of something that i love so much, that is a part of me? how can i be so afraid to jump straight down into the water, to let the waves wash over my head? when this lake is such a part of me? but that is how i am. i am afraid of what is inside of me; i am afraid of the lake. i am afraid of letting go of the pavement, the lowest, the common. i am afraid of what comes next, when there is nothing under my feet to pound against. i am afraid of leaping straight down, because what if i never stop falling, what if i never learn to fly, what if i was never meant to leap at all?

i pound against the pavement; the friction holds me in place. the lowest, the common, it holds me steady. i pound it relentlessly.

one day it will give way.