Close

Close

by Kelp

Come closer.
Closer.
A little bit closer.
Alright.  Not too close.
That’s close enough.

I tried to get close to you. 
I said, after our tongues intertwined.
I tried to get close to you. 
I said, after our bodies intertwined.

Then we were at a baseball game.
We were very close to the field – actually, we were on the field.
On the sideline, but close to the action.  The players loomed large.
I wasn’t sure if you were as excited as I was. 
I kept trying to take your hand in mine, but it would not stay.

My father was there.  He was standing near the third base line. 
As I came closer to him his eyes lit up in recognition. “Have you ever been this close?” I asked him. “Have you ever been this close?”
“No,” he said.  “This is the closest I have ever been.  It’s a whole different experience.”
I suddenly saw that the most important thing in life was to be close.  To be as close as possible.

And I could see the multitude of colours in your eyes.
And the tiniest hairs inside your ears.
The striations of your skin and fingernails and toenails. 
The smallest bumps on the nipples of your breasts.
I wanted a closeness that was strange and original and shocking and different and new and refreshing and revelatory.  

And I could see how much it was scary and dangerous and uncomfortable for you. 
Ow!
That cut too close. 
Ow! 
That was a close one.
Too close! Too close for comfort.

You tell me that you prefer mystery.  And privacy. 
A shared experience for you:
We are each of us reading our own book in the same room.

It was many years ago but you still remind me:
The times when I read your journals
Without asking your permission.
I knew I had crossed a line,
But I thought it would be worth it.
All I wanted was to know you better,
And more intimately.

Trying to navigate between close and too close;
Trying to optimize close
Without slipping into suffocate.
I wanted close to be something that was not the opposite of open.
Something that wasn’t conjoined with disappointment.
I took it on as a challenge:
How to optimize close.

And when he died, they asked me: “Were you close?”  And I said: “Yes, we were close.  We were very close.”

Because it was like a race, and it was a close finish. But the finish was close because the whole race had been close. 
And even before the race. 
Sometimes close has no beginning. 

But with you there is no end to it.

Those moments of clarity within the blur. We’ve known them.

It’s the clarity within the blur. That’s what being close to you means to me.