Looking down at my left arm it’s not the same arm I’m used to seeing. I can see this arm being in outer space. I can see it on an ocean vessel. I can see it in Venice, half a warm embrace.
I see this arm can be wherever it wants to be. This arm is attached to a changed human being. The man I’m meant to be; calm, confident, insightful, gaining rationality.
It’s strange I usually see only half of myself, the half with no confidence, the side people tend to see. I take a mental picture of that place with tense, insecurity.
Getting up from my chair because of immense anxiety I have a moment in front of the mirror, content at age 50.
With the skill to see my arm as a ship circling the moon, I can take that arm, take these words and carve out a new room.
The arm on my left against the arm that lacks courage, the one with which I write. I sit down again in my chair as if I have forgotten.
Francis Erich McElroy 