The scream of the tram is a flock of whistles outside my window. I am halfway across the room before I see Berlin.

I walk past a car with its sliding door open. A child inside cries and it pulls me off the sidewalk. The adults around the car are the child’s caretakers. No one wears a mask. Even the child is no longer upset.

I walk past brown-skinned neighbors, at ease and chatting freely in their native tongue. My protective arms jump. I look for the threat. Other white faces walk past, absorbed in normal life. My brown-skinned neighbors walk on, their normal lives unfolding.

—

It takes a conscious effort to see the kitchen I walk into every morning. It takes a conscious effort to go to the studio, warm up my body, listen to my instructors, receive my classmates’ experimental offerings.

—

i am not there

i cannot put my arms around those i love

i cannot put my body between those i love and those who hate them

i cannot put my body on streets my body knows

my home is not my home (what is?). i cannot offer shelter.

my body cannot see what it has seen so many times before

my body cannot see what it has never seen before

my body cannot unsee what it has seen.

my body cannot weigh another body down, keep it from being taken to where no body belongs.

i know. 

i tell myself

i know.

if i were there

i could not keep bodies i love safe

i could not keep bodies from disappearing into bodiless buildings systems lies

my body is no better than the bodies of so many i can name and cannot name at bearing witness, taking space, carrying food, keeping watch

dying.

—

if i were there i’d be just another body with a whistle

and i don’t think there is anything better to be than a body with a whistle

but i am not there

and i don’t have a whistle

and i don’t know why

i don’t know why i’m not there

i don’t know why i would be there

i would know what to do if i were there 

i’m not there.

how do i love in this moment if i cannot put my body on the line?

like jesus

you (plural) follow where love leads

one foot in front of the other, one hungry mouth, one panicked voice, one stranger in our midst

body to body

to body

to body

to body

you follow where love leads you.

even unto death. 

dear god, no more death.

—

love led me here. love brought my body here. love of the body brought me here, where we daily find the cosmos in our bodies, keep connected to that old mysterious song as we move, as we bring atoms, gods, and grief to fill the empty space.

—

Liam’s body is a cosmos!

[Name redacted]’s body is a cosmos!

Jonathan’s body is a cosmos! His brutal finger holds two lives, his and hers, forever twined.

Normal life continues, somewhere!

Somewhere, people are safe!

May we take comfort in the fact that we have joined the angry river of humanity zip-tied and choked by small, brutal men who fear the cosmos we contain.

May we take comfort in the fact that they have already lost.

Forgive me for saying “we” with lungs free of burning smoke.

—

my observations are obvious and inadequate. i have no answer.

i want to believe my distance will give me some perspective you can use. i have nothing to offer you yet.

i am following your (plural) lead. i will follow where love leads. love led me here. 

i will follow where love leads. help me follow where love leads.