WALKING AWAY SLOWLY, 1.5 MILES PER HOUR ❋ Eli Tareq El Bechelany-Lynch

I tell you that I am writing to you as an aesthetic experiment in perception. You tell
you’re writing a paper on the dandruff in my hair and the way I wiggle my legs when
I’m anxious and the way I navigate space in a small room. You love space. I sidestep
your hand trying to fix my shirt collar and you lean into the hug I offer you. I sit by
the window to pretend I’m outside. I write in my notebook pretend I’m inside. I
chirp a poem to you and you take it in your mouth happily. We try to push and pull
and it breaks in two. It sprouts two individual bodies, wiggling away from us. We
watch as it takes them two hundred and forty seconds to get to the patch of green,
finally hiding. We count the seconds on our fingers. I count the odd. You count the
even. When the poems disappear, I tell you I need to leave. You tell me you didn’t
imagine being outside with me. I tell you I’m always inside with you.