Unhinged.
When I awoke this morning, the universe presented itself to me in broken fragments; ragged, dangerous shards of reality poking at my senses. Time and space unconnected, their various dimensionalities unrelated to one another: This random axis extended infinitely off into the depths of the closet; that tiny, curled spatial coordinate hovered over an old pair of sneakers by the chair; the corner of 8:17 tomorrow night and the Washington monument cowered under the bed. My own temporal sense seemed to be orbiting a ratty old robe I threw out fifteen years ago.
Turning over, I cut myself on the sharp edge of an ancient regret.
It is raining outside now, great fat drops falling in steady streams. I can hear the bamboo canes rattling in the breeze and the jungle whispers quietly to itself, the ohi’a shushing the hapu’u below, the hapu’u answering with dripping defiance their opinions from the forest floor. Raining harder, the steel roof adds its own thunder to the conversation, the forest responding with renewed, louder demands for silence.
I wonder if I can get out of bed without upsetting the balance of the universe or pissing off the jungle still further. Maybe I’ll just stay where I am.
Or did I do that already?