The night is cool and calm, the brilliant eye of the moon wide shut. My pulse races, blood of her blood; it is time. I close my eyes and approach the silent edge of consciousness, stepping over with arms outstretched. It is always thus, a leap of faith.

( Dreaming in darkness, I breathe her in. )

-- written for the Remyth Project.

... so. uh. in the middle of my fic editing, this idea popped into my head and wouldn't leave, so. i wrote it. or, well, started it. i'm sure you guys can figure out the idea behind this one from the title (well, hopefully); if not, there's a little background here. also, any suggestions for more detailed research sources* would be deeply appreciated! &hearts

*by which i mean, other than Wikipedia, for post-WWII Japan, folklore, origami, leukemia, etc. ;)

Title: a thousand paper cranes

99.
The washi crinkles beneath her hands, the crisp crackle of it like dry flowers. She aligns the corners precisely, presses down firmly with her fingernail. ( Crease. )

There is no map for us.

Once upon a time, a nation that dreamed said to the world, "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore." So the people with yellow skin joined all the other dreaming people and crossed the ocean to a land without dragons, a land newly-minted and shining with hope and riches.

Or so they thought.

Once upon a time- no, that's not right. Once upon no time, the men and women who shared my skin toiled in a Land of Opportunity. They were coolies and construction workers, laundromat-owners, "comfort women" and mail-order brides. They lived- and died- in a place where people only saw in black and white, and they were neither white enough nor black enough to fit the citizens' perceptions. If their neighbors saw white as people and black as not-people, or vice versa, then the men and women who shared my skin were simply not: invisible, inaudible, ignored.

Years passed, and more of their fellows came from over the seas, and so the invisible ones turned their sight inward, toward their own. They made communities within their cities, crafting homes-away-from-home out of their loneliness, their bitterness, their exile. They worked hard to try to lift themselves out of the blue-collar class, despite the fact that no matter where they went or where they worked, no one saw them. They worked hard and swallowed their pride because things like family and duty could not be ignored, and if things like honor and respect and acknowledgment weren't attainable for their generation, perhaps they could be secured for their children, or for their children's children.

Thus was the "model minority."

Years passed, and their children came of age in a place where their faces were not. When they learned of dragons, they did not learn about the dragons of the east, but the dragons of the west. When they spoke in school, they did not speak the tongues of their parents, but the tongues of the strangers without their skin. Slowly and surely, despite the best efforts of their parents, these children lost their heritage and became something else, something new, something not of one world or the other. Slowly and surely, these children set their feet on different roads, ones outside the edges of all the maps, and began to walk forward, without compasses.

There is still no map for us.

Once upon no time, the men and women who shared my skin came to the shores of a land of many dreams. Some wanted to stay, and some wanted to return to their roots, but all of them dreamed of home.

-- written for the Remyth Project.

This is me, and this is you. Standing half-blinded by the sun, looking up into a perfect sky, it feels like something’s flying away from us, way up where blue turns into black, so far it’s impossible to imagine or describe. For once, there is no such thing as memory. Just two people, standing together, eyes half-closed, faces turned up; simpler than the concept of “friends,” than the concept of “boy” and “girl” (though, if you think about it, boy and girl are far more complicated than we give them credit for). We’re just two people in this spot at this minute, soaking in the light of a warm afternoon.

This is me, and this is you. It doesn’t matter what we were or are, separately or together, boy, girl, boy-and-girl or girl-and-boy. Right now, we’re too simple to be analyzed in such complicated ways. It doesn’t matter whowhatwhy I am or whowhatwhy you are, not when we’re squinting up into infinity, this huge thing so much more incomprehensible than either or both of us. Two people, standing together in the sunshine, this is nothing and everything, two and one, infinity and zero. And yet, when it comes right down to it, it’s just me and you and us.

posted 2.11.05 on my other lj

it was the sunshine in my face that woke me, the soft and quiet blue in the cracks between the blinds. not the things you said or did that stuck in my mind, not the way the light hit (or missed) your face. not a remembered violin concerto, or a shoe thrown in the parking lot, or exuberant strains of jazz and laughter filtering through the heat of a summer afternoon. not the way, bumping into a remembered face, it's just like meeting some stranger in the subway, with no recognition at all. so say goodbye to memory, to regret, to the risen ghosts walking in the moonlight, because it's morning now-- a new day-- and the sunrise was just like yesterday's.

posted 2.18.05 on my other lj

sad without a reason.
it feels like an ocean inside of me. restless and quiet, the wind rushing through the marrow of my bones; so cold i can taste the pale winter sky.
last night i walked back from lg rehearsal, passing the christmas-lit trees, remembering. or maybe just thinking. inside of me is quietness; ocean, wind, the tides flowing through my veins. inside you, the beat of the bass guitar pulses in time with your heart, a rhythm tangible in every step, even when you aren't dancing; the rush of city traffic, city lights. i thrive in silence, you revel in noise; but somehow our two worlds overlap, and we can meet in the margins. yet i can't help wondering, remembering your words when you listened to the yo yo ma last night: if i were with you, would your noise eventually engulf my silence? if you were with me, would my silence drown out your noise?
nothing is ever as simple as it appears.

you'll be back tomorrow.

i need to go somewhere. your heart lives inside this house, not mine. mine goes fishing in the sky; i cannot be your anchor. already i miss the taste of flight, the giddy rush of casting myself upward, falling into endless blue; the wind in those high and solitary places of the world an animal craving in the back of my throat. a desire as far beyond my control as the sea.

(waves breaking on a long shore, the lushness of the air and the taste of brine so vivid i could almost think they were real. all the songs in the world to be found in that sound.)

what is it that binds us to each other? chance. blood. all the things that should matter. and yet how far apart we have become, how different and estranged. i cannot be an idol, an angel, any shred of saving grace. i am only distance, only space, only time. how can any of these things allow for understanding? and yet i know you better than you think, i have watched as carefully as i can.

this metamorphosis is your own. would you believe me if i said that i don't care if you become a moth or a butterfly? because i really don't, as long as you learn to fly, taking a leap of faith. as long as you stand at the edge of that waterfall and make the decision to fall with your eyes closed, heart beating fast.

so many stars in the velvet night sky, so many wishes, hidden away in that chamber of secrets between my lungs; but only this, the wish of my heart.

slipping out the back door i slide it
gently closed behind me
walking into the chill breeze that caresses my face
the CD player skipping capriciously in my pocket

passing the familiar houses i feel at peace and solitary
the music ringing in my ears
a child cries a greeting and i miss it twice
before turning guiltily the third time during a skip of the infernal machine

the grey sky looks dreary yet
broodingly beautiful
cracks of pale blue with white rays arrowing down
illuminating chance passers-by in random benediction

beneath the erratic snatches of music like an undercurrent
the rush of tires passing me by without pause
but i do not care waving to an old man strolling by as
leaves of lower branches cling stubbornly like pale imploring fingers of last year's ghosts

in the cold imperfect weather i feel
immortal untouchable remote in the heart of life
and why not? for the clouds have parted the sun shines and even though it is unreasonable
today i feel it shines for me

one of these days
you will fit your footsteps to mine
and discover that i exist
or don't
perhaps you too will become the ghost that paces
back and forth in this
blind alley- the
forgotten one
with eyes like falling stars that look into
forever and beyond

one of these days
you will look into the mirror
and see my face looking back at you
or not
perhaps you too will become the ghost that flutters
around and around in this
mute cage- the
forgotten one
with voiceless cries resounding in the
in-between spaces

one of these days
you will wake in the night
and find that i am gone
or not
perhaps you too will become this presence
this loneliness that can be rocked
or ignored
because sometimes knowing
nothing at all can make you
infinite.

Nightfall now, and I'm watching the moon go by, across cool velvet darkness as precious as a kiss. How long now since a windfall made me smile? Only so thick a layer of spacetime, only this curtain's width from yesterday.

The wind through the leaves reminds me of the sea. I can taste the salt as if it were a drop of blood splashed on white silk, like a rose petal.

We played the game reckless, sporadically and late, as if we had nothing to lose. Nothing but a few minutes in a library, a night of laughter and beans spilled across the floor, missed music and a shoe cast down in the parking lot. Nothing but funny faces from time to time in the hallway, a broken smile, pool water dripping from wet hair. Nothing to lose but time, and ours is up.

But sometime between dusk and dawn, in this precious solitary silence, the ghosts can rise up and walk again, dead minutes and hours too dear for the harsh clarity of daylight. So let them live, this little while, in the shadows cast by the other side of the sun.