The Chill

It shouts out loud and I move slowly.  Shadows fall upon my skin and I twitch.  Tiny bumps form, signaling coldness, but I don’t grasp for warmth.  I let the chill travel over my body, the shaking subsides and I am calm, slow.  On a cloud of emptiness I think of how I could change myself.  Absorb this current me, forming a completely new persona.  Extremities heavy, I walk in a line across your skin.  Fingers travel from elbow to shoulder and I am suddenly back.  This trip wasn’t as long as the last one.  My hands, still convulsing from the energy that reverberated in my skull.  My fingers feel foreign, as if detached and rearticulated.  Using one, I point to the ground.  That’s where he is now, dirt and dust.  I brush my fingers through the dirt, dry and dusty, and smell the fresh earth.  His tongue, now silent, his hands now still, and I shed a tear.  I feel a sense of shame, shame for him, as if taking his form momentarily.  I feel the craving, the need for it.  I understand the words he now speaks in whispers when the wind blows.  I apologize silently to no one, my hand falling on the grass, slipping through my fingertips.