Night Words


Dear Eugene,

There's a change in my life and from now on I'll be a night writer.

I will write you last thing of the day instead of first thing in the morning, reflections baptized by the vicissitude of waking hours, not fanciful beasts of yesternight.

I've just installed a blue-light filter on this laptop because my eyes are tired, but it doesn't help my rapidly dying brain.  I can already feel a difference in my writing: my tongue is not as sharp.  Thoughts don't rush out to meet the sun, don't charge forward to seize the day.  I am composing a dirge.

The change is neither good nor bad, asks for no appraisal; a change it simply is.  The life I live is what calls for sizing up, under a new metric, stretched to an unfamiliar dimension.  It is up to me to get down to the new shapes and strange colors, draw at night a picture that would hopefully survive the clear-eyed scrutiny of the next daybreak.

Goodnight.  A night that closes with words has to be good.

Yours, Alex

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