No backyard waking up to dawn to greet me and inspire me, only blackness of the first few hours of day. I sit in the garage, coffee cup in hand, peek through the curtained window on the door and frightened somewhat by the misty Transylvanian view, I stay inside. There be bears, or at the very least a sullen skunk to skulk within the swirling dew that stretches to the sky.
I listened to my man, went to bed instead of falling into slumber on the couch at ten o’clock. So here I am at two and three a.m. awakened and alert.
I pondered darkness. Closed my eyes to make it darker still and wondered if the little bit of change made any difference. Mental mapping guides me from one doorstep to another and finds the cup I set down on the step. I take a sip, close my eyes and touch my face. What if I never had before seen it or any other human’s? Does the curve my fingers follow down my cheek tell me a shape? Can I learn what I or others look like by the bumps of eyelids, projection of a nose? What big difference is there in being suddenly blinded and given that at birth? What are perceptions formed of when there is no likened basis of knowledge? If I run my hands on either side of me down from my face, my neck and down my shoulders, out my arms, do I visualize by touch alone an image?
I go back inside into the light and touch my fingers to my forehead, shoulders, heart; to cross myself in thanks.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology