by Aaron Fernando
I’ve never felt like the night is strangling me.
Maybe that sounds strange, but what I find strange are the people who fear mere negative space. No, not just “fear”—they allow themselves to personify it, shape it into a million outstretched hands blindly reaching out for them as they shiver in the darkness.
They turn the most primal form of nonexistence into an existence, and they expect me to follow suit. But I can’t, because I’ve never thought twice about the darkness strangling me, because it envelops me, in the way a parent does with their child when they’re out of sight for one moment too long.
And I can do this because not only have I never felt like the darkness and my own existence were contradictory, but I’ve also never felt like they were one and the same. It’s more of a coincidental coexistence, a gradual nod-of-the-head as we dip into one another, attempting to catch a glimpse from the other’s perspective for as long as we can before coming up for air.
The streetlight above me flickers. It’s morning, and we hear it together.
