Guarding the Silence
It was built during the industrial period. Just another factory on the island of misfit twenty-somethings, now a residence. The bricks are scuffed with expensive age, like faded and ripped jeans sold on Fifth Avenue, a massive worn-down structure not quite neglected.
It is quiet – well, quiet as a city can be during the lulling hours, when thirsty brains thick with fatigue rest in unconscious bliss and the introverts, those lovers of solitude, guard the silence over cups of slow-brew coffee and contemplate the exact shades of shadows. Cool turquoise on cream yellow.
On a low couch that doubles as a mattress sits a young man, a soft cotton cap pulled snug, with facial hair an indiscriminate scruff. He could be anyone; tomorrow’s hobo pushing a carriage of plastic bottles to redeem and failed dreams to grieve, or he could crack the world wide open. He sits on his couch, watching the sunlight stream in from those wide windows, plucking the wire cords of his guitar, challenging the words and notes to mold themselves to his mood, that particular time between dawn and day when everything is possible but souls wish the stillness of now, infinite.
Generations have passed between these walls, and there will be generations more. But far from overlooking the young man, a blip on the spectrum of time, these arms of brick, steel, and glass cradle him. He is neither too small nor too brief. The world does not forget: he is the point of all this.