Upon finishing Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, I was left much more affected than I’d been during the previous dozen chapters. The dense philosophy had lost my attention many times, but I kept reading, hoping that satisfaction was waiting by the end. And it was, although it took until the Afterward for things to really sink in.

Robert M. Pirsig explained the concept of time that the Ancient Greeks had understood. Often, we think of ourselves walking forward through time, facing tomorrow. This is inaccurate, as it fails to address two crucial elements of perception and time. First, we cannot see and we cannot predict tomorrow; thus we do not face it. Second, the past is never at our backs because we see it the entire time, however fading away it seems. So it is, then, that the author wrote, “They saw the future as something that came upon them from behind their backs with the past receding away before their eyes.” Continued…

To my horror, I’d lost her. On each floor, by the stairs, under the bed; she was missing. She, a tiny human baby in its larval form, without any defining features, without bones or muscle, smaller than my palm. I was taking care of my niece in this dream and set her down for a moment, and then either the wind or chance blew and carried her away, over the railing beside me. Frantically, I ran down the stairs — three sets of them — checking for her meticulously at each level, but there she wasn’t.

In time, she appeared from nowhere, a girl that had no insect-like qualities, a girl that looked everything like a beautiful young woman. And it was at this point, in this confusion, that I woke up uncertainly. My pillow still under my head, my love still by my side. My niece, still nowhere.

As winter sets in, life stops. The leaves fall under the snow and trees begin their long wait. The cold snaps at them the entire season long, and all they can do is endure as best they can.

And when the world thaws, the tree begins its fight back to life. Its branches once again form leaves to catch the sun and rain, and it does everything it must to grow stronger than it was. And when the winter begins to set in, the tree endures, because all of nature knows that sooner or later it must.

9 o’clock thursday night
with a scientist
– a first year biochemist, to be exact –
who knew science would save us
a militant atheist
– so he claimed –
but didn’t see that his belief
was as fierce as if
science were his god
and his god, infallible

On the edge of a desert cliff, staring down into an endless black, I wonder how I might cross. There is a fountain on the other side. Overflowing. Trickling down into the gorge. As long as I have been here watching it, sun beating me to ash, it’s been gathering below me. Years, years, years, it must be a river by now. So thirsty, the water could catch me.

I do not look back. Turn, walk the world around. Feet burn in the sand with every step. Everything is behind me, I know it. And everything I need is on the other side of that canyon. I know this. So I do not look back.

And when I arrive at the other side, when I finally reach the fountain, I drink from it. And I live. And then I look across the emptiness and see myself standing there, staring. Thirsty. Lost in dreams.

When I wake, I wonder which side I am on. If I’m really living or if it just feels that way. And I wonder if maybe, if I’m not willing to dive, if I should at least start walking.

I said, “I just have got to get my life in order.”

And my life said, “What’s the rush?”

So I replied, “I’m getting bored.”

Apathy looked up, said, “Yeah, but we have fun together, don’t we?”

I said to him, “No, we don’t.”

Apathy said, “Well, we certainly spend enough time together.”

Ambition turned to us, interrupting. “Yes, and I think he’s had exactly that: enough time with you.”

Apathy did not argue. He never has to. Some people don’t have to say anything to make their point.

Distraction flashed his eager grin, captivating. So nobody said anything for a quite a long time, until I broke the silence, and I said:

“I just have got to get my life in order.”

At the point when this took place, I could feel daylight softening across my face, but I was still very much asleep.

There was no line at all, anywhere, when I began to wait. I was just tired of moving, so I stopped. I heard a noise behind me and turned. There was a man, and behind him, another man. As I leaned further over, I could see a line of men endlessly behind me, all appearing from nothing, queued up; and and whereas before I was simply tired of moving, now I was at the head of something enormous. Now I had purpose that I hadn’t been aware of. And still, I did not know what it was.