For the first time since I’ve been here, the sky was clear in Nagahama. At night, we rode our bikes from the station down side streets, with gutter water rushing at our heels & the sky held perfect the perforation of Orion’s Belt. And I remembered how my father took me to a clearing to show me when Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn, & Jupiter were vertically aligned. This will happen no more times in my father’s lifetime & only once more in mine. http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/planets_align_020402-1.html

Before I came here, one thing that put my nerves to ease was the fact that the sky would be the same. It’s not. What I look at as dark is day at home, besides the light pollution & smog. There are no stars in Chicago, no night, no sky. And when I did finally see the stars here, it just made me realize how far away I am.




It’s funny how when I try to remember my dreams, they consistently lack location. There are few familiar faces, few people in them at all. The alienation might be getting to me, pulling me apart; I’m used to being alone, but this is more than alone. This dream-state combination of being stared at & ignored by locals, of being unheard, taciturn, gesticulating every word. I’ve begun to find pride in the post office, the grocery store, train excursions.

I’ve found friends in the manuscripts I’m reading. I carry them around in my bicycle basket like dolls. They sit in a stack on the chair next to me as I drink coffee. And they are like me, only much less overt with their gestures & a little more literally quiet.