{"id":306,"date":"2016-01-30T23:26:57","date_gmt":"2016-01-31T04:26:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alexanderlyle.com\/?page_id=306"},"modified":"2017-02-15T15:30:10","modified_gmt":"2017-02-15T20:30:10","slug":"river-passage-breathing-i-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/works\/river-passage-breathing-i-2\/","title":{"rendered":"River Passage (Breathing I)"},"content":{"rendered":"

5 hours 2 minutes
\nAlexander Lyle
\nUnnamed River, Ashvem, India<\/p>\n

\"\"
\n1:48:pm
\nlaying – before me stillness like the Himalayas of nothingness
\nmaybe this will be easy
\nmaybe I have no idea what will come
\ntime
\nthe sun incrementally pours its weight into me
\nand the water comes with relief to my slowly quieting mind
\nI can feel it clearly – a cool line encircling my body – creeping higher
\nslow like the blood pulsing from the far reaches of my body.
\nreaching out for my ears gently at first, then with maddening percussion
\nthere’s nothing to do but wait for the roar of transition to subside
\nand then wait for the water to rise past my eyes, my mouth
\nwait
\nclicking sounds travel through the water from around me – hours later I would learn their source as crabs pinched at my toes, fingers and right ear
\nin time water laps over my parched lips,
\na brief struggle to calm my breath as it comes and goes through the length of bamboo
\nthen peace
\nfor a while
\nslowly my nose plugs fail
\nvaguely salty water starts to slide down my throat and my fingers can’t seem to pinch my nose in any way to prevent it
\nmore water
\na decision to make
\ndo I stop now and try again another day? Have I failed?
\ncommitment – at the end of the day I know the work here is the commitment and not the image
\nI buried the bamboo and arched my back to bring my mouth and nose just above the water
\nand began
\nwater played over my eyes like the patterns of an Arabic partition
\nbreath large in my skull like a a ragged horn through fog
\nand then that familiar space of clarity
\nthat old friend: a quiet mind
\n…
\n…
\na deep dull pain
\nand then spasms
\nthe right hip first and later the left as well
\ncold
\nwas I shaking from the cold or from the fatigue in my hips from arching my back to breathe?
\ncan’t stop shaking
\nwhy do I do this? Does it mean anything to anyone? Does it mean anything to me?
\nWho is this man struggling for his life in knee deep water?
\ntime passes – time must pass – the tide must pass
\ncan I do any more?<\/p>\n

it’s just a body<\/p>\n

the frontier<\/p>\n

and a new peace – not the peace that occasionally calmed the spasms and found warmth in tightly held arms but a peace that rolled right on through the clenched teeth – burning legs – shaking body reality<\/p>\n

it came
\nbriefly<\/p>\n

but without fail
\nagain and again
\nand with it came support
\nthe edges of my body lost definition
\nthe edges of my mind lost definition
\nI knew I was right where I was supposed to be – I ceased to feel like an alien in the river<\/p>\n

like fingers on my scalp the water seemed to hold, almost push, my head up
\ntension left my neck, shoulders, back
\nand then the calm of high tide – I could feel the sun warming up the still water – just enough for me to continue on<\/p>\n

that must have been just past half way<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

…and peace of mind or no my body was pushing it’s limits with each moment
\nI opened my eyes for the first time since laying down
\nand saw over head in a royal blue sky a circling sea eagle
\nlife
\nthe sun will set eventually – an hour, two? Some unit of time
\nit’s just time
\nit’s just a body
\n…
\n…<\/p>\n

6:44pm
\nthe tide had been on it’s way out but had a way to go
\nI knew – my body knew – that it was time
\nI sat up feeling the world fall away from me – the hard edges of everything disorienting and strange
\nlike a new born baby I wept – uncontrollably – without thought or understanding
\nand slowly I walked away from the river.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

5 hours 2 minutes Alexander Lyle Unnamed River, Ashvem, India 1:48:pm laying – before me stillness like the Himalayas of nothingness maybe this will be easy maybe I have no idea what will come time the sun incrementally pours its weight into me and the water comes with relief to my slowly quieting mind I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":5,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-306","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":608,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/306\/revisions\/608"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexanderlyle.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}