A Priori

her own room was scented with lavender

and beeswax

vibrating with a delicate fervour

this room was where her many possible selves

aligned into an single creature

illuminated by sun or moon

this room was subject to its own relativity

allowing her thoughts to somersault endlessly

through the flush airspace

of a zero hour

this room was untroubled

her refuge from all that stormed

beyond its walls

*

in time she moved

far away

travelling

forwards

backwards

starboard

and port

ascending and descending

along longitudes and latitudes

that stretched by degrees and minutes

across the mantle of the onrushing moment

*

out there

behind the horizon

she discovered many rooms

rooms glimpsed

through luminous windows

past tall archways

from doors left ajar…

rooms she visited

with curiosity

expectation

elation

indecision

and dread

*

in some of the rooms the air was cool and sweet

other rooms were close and warm

bodies pressed past one another

in an polyhedral dance of limbs

and fabrics

voices buzzed north and south

eyes glanced east and west

skin blushed against skin

a lone wasp drifted near the chandelier

*

when she slept

she found herself

in rooms of ambiguous dimensions

shadowed antechambers

elaborate halls

rooms from centuries ago

rooms she had seen

without a cornea

an iris

or a retina

*

after a while

it was difficult to determine which rooms had been

real

and which had been invented

the catalogue of times and places she carried inside

was a disarranged opus

of truths and wishes

an improvised reconciliation with reality

bare

and unpredictable

like the room she was in

at this very moment…

*

was it scented with lavender?

was it untroubled?

turning towards the dark figure in the corner

she said,

“Each day I find myself balancing upon the tip

of a magnetic needle…

veering for equilibrium…

amid the flurries…

and I wonder…

if I were to fall…

would you catch me?”

*

but the dark figure had vanished

and she was suddenly alone

sealed inside the only room

she had ever truly occupied…

a room so small

one could cradle it in the palm of their hand

for an instant she felt trapped

smothered by the claustrophobia

of her own self-awareness

so to expel her impermanence

she shut her eyes

*

now in darkness

she was safe

for all that remained in this room

was her intuition

it had no shape, scent or colour

but it was there

tethered to her decisions

like a phantom sibling

no matter where she went 

or what events might befall her

this silent whisper would be with her

echoing from rooms she was unable to know

deep inside the abstract architecture

of her sentience