I plucked the white sphere off the sidewalk and almost dropped it again. An eye stared up from my hand. It wasn’t real, just glass, cool and dry. The crowd bustled, oblivious, around me. Then a girl was in front of me. Waist high in a pretty white dress. Her eyes were downcast, long lashes resting on rosy cheeks. Her hand gripped my wrist. “Is this yours?” I asked.

She tilted her head up, feathery lashes rising over empty sockets. “No,” she said, her other clawed hand on my cheek. “It’s yours.”

There are no physical limits on the human spirit

Our love covers the universe

While contained in a prison of flesh

Reaches out from the confines of our skulls

into the future

We are at once finite, limited

Trapped in time and skin

And infinite

Unlimited

Omnipresent

We do not grow as kittens to the cat

Larger versions of who we once were

But as acorns to the tree

Changing our form into something unrecognizable

Reaching ever upward

Until we reach out

Tangling our branches with others

guarding the ground around us

Adding our strength to the whole forest

inspiring others to transform

The caterpillar had the butterfly in it all along

Inside the chrysalis dissolving, reassembling

The same substance finding beauty and wings

What are the stars when we aren’t looking?

Tableaux of warriors, gods and heroes?

Or atoms, plasma burning?

The universe looks to us,

Orphaned children, drifting.

The only eyes within it,

Painting meaning on the void.