Listen, here. Listen, hear.

Can magic and meaning coexist? That lingers long on the mind when watching the dust settle between the shoulders of reluctant viewers, nebulae in collision all the same. Making little of madness requires great effort, so rather than strain I exhale, hear the click-and-roll of industrial projectors, and allow the cool sluggishness of my expectations to encapsulate the experience.

But were it for a lack of phone or a misplaced signal, I would not be here. Were it for a mid-road collision, an offday, or a home game, the same applies. Though none of that occurred, and with buttocks in seat I watch. And watch as a life becomes unraveled for experimentation, curiosity mingled with the occasional visit to unprecedented violence. Youth becoming man, man remembering youth, and all the bittersweet happenings smudged in twine that cement the conditioning of one to the idea of death.

Troubling bits of life displayed. Stolen undergarments and jaws rubbed to the callous by frustrated, wrinkled hands. Coughing elderly women, coffee the scent of French fields, punctuated by a Kodak slide-reel of grey terrain, clicking with quarter-notes to the beat of a tone-deaf whistler. Our feet pump city streets almost effortlessly, yet if we could float we would seek the end of all need. Sunrise in the Antarctic. Images of blasted lands, and a single Cello yawns with the silent ferocity of spirited wind.

There's something oddly comforting about sharing darkness with others. It's as if I rolled into a blanket and found strangers waiting inside, but without the awkward bumping and feeling that would normally accompany such a gesture. Ignoring the synchronized snot-rumbling, and barring the unnecessary chittering, phone-checking, and teeth clacking, the darkness is a communal sector for spiritual ease to be attained. I'd share it with you anytime, in fact we have, and it didn't strike me at the time but keeping the black to ourselves meant much more than I cared to know.

At a certain point, somewhere between critical exhaustion and the failure to achieve nirvana, I threw my hands up and expelled weakness. Strength became a credo, better yet, a necessity. But even at that point, strength couldn't heal, reveal, unwind, and make short wind of the stress that plagues us all. Strength can be the best rallying point, but it is surely the worst camp. Strength will never be a home, if only because a home requires a hearth, warmth, surety of grace, and the crinkles that cap off grins.

It is just as well, for linoleum doesn't make a home either. No, more than brick, mortar, sweat, labor, or a hefty contracting job, a home builds itself, supported by the backs of those within it. A gesture one remembers, a picture taken in the backyard, tears shed on carpet flooring, a stain to mark zealous coffee consumption; these are all photographs in time, and seconds flung off the hands of the clock upon which our memory's eye feasts.

Days of struggle are behind and promptly in front, with the resolute residing soundly betwixt. The middle makes all, and the fortitude, willpower, and tenacity of those who push through the failures of the past and stride onward into a halcyon future are all founded on a fondness for the present. Feel the walls you think might be crushing you. Sniff the breeze that could carry a sickness. Breath in one's lungs and feet on the ground are so beautiful it's heart-crushing to think of a time when we could be without one or the other. Mentality bridges our bodies to a world of all-forgiving light, and the bulb hearkens unerringly.