Unclosed

inspired by Poe with the word "unclosed"

Closed, my eyes have always been closed. Not necessarily the aspect of one’s eyes being shut but rather the veiling of sight. My eyes have are closed to a world that I will never know, yet are open to one you will never know. Within the dark I thrive to survive and to understand. Within the dark, I live with my eyes unclosed.

            I have never seen a mowed lawn or read a book. I have never awakened to my mother’s face in the morning nor gazed at a painting. But I am content and have learned to accept myself and my personal attributes. I do not pity myself but rather the ones who see. To live each day with sight is too great a prize for me. An imagination is all I need.

            It is strange to stop and ponder what color looks like or perchance what rain is. Even though I lack eyesight I do try to “see” these things in my mind. The color red probably looks like what water feels like- harsh yet subtly luring you in. At times when it rains I sit upon my porch and only allow one hand to catch the droplets. Little kisses brief and bold peck my palm bringing a sense of peace.

            It often crosses my mind whether or not light will ever penetrate this world I have adopted. On rare occasions, I yearn for the beauty of sight. A continuous nagging from the depth of my chest   rises above my contention on various occasions. I usually reign over my emotions yet sometimes it slips from my hold. When I do have my low moments I often find myself listening to audiobooks or symphonies by a man who became deaf yet inspired the realm of music. 

            As the summer came I would always go to the library to listen to those precious audiobooks. The routine was monotonous after a few weeks, and, to my surprise, someone disrupted this routine of boredom one day. Asking to read to me for lack of a better audience an empty-filled feminine voice sat down next to me. I reluctantly accepted. Since I was homeschooled, I did not seem to work well with kids my age. Of course, she did all the talking the first day. Her name was Maggie, age “seventeen years young” (her exact words); she described her eyes as the black keys of a piano strangely simple yet beautiful. After her introduction, I heard her fumbling for a book. Having found the book she read “Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carol. My personal favorite, I might add. Have you ever read it?”

            My response was too harsh, I believe, for I quickly replied, “No.” Not wanting to offend her I then added, “I’d love for you to read to me though.”

As Maggie read as my imagination began to wonder if such a thing really happens when one falls down a rabbit hole. But her voice kept pulling me back in; the inflection of her voice was moving as did the characters reactions. She read with such emotion that no longer could my mind lead away but instead desperately waited for the next word to escape her lips. In that moment I was released from my captivity of darkness to find hope and a new life revealed from some seventeen year old girl who simply read words from a book.  Somewhere behind the voice was a soft stroking noise- a disrupting annoyance.

“Stop that,” I whispered not wanting my voice to prevail hers. Yet the noise continued, creating a burst of disturbance in that moment of infinity.

“Maggie? Maggie, please stop doing that it is very frustrating.”

“You will have to bear it if you want me to finish.”

And so I bore that burden of holding my opinion of the soft noise. As the days passed, I continued to go to the library to meet the girl and also the strange noise. Yet the question often consumed my concentration as I had grown accustomed to it. A week after beginning the book she closed the back cover and sighed.

“Wow, don’t you just love the book? Do you have any questions about it at all?”

I did. The question that had grown to haunt me: the noise.

“Maggie, what was that noise that was continually occurring while you read?”

Silence hung like a thick fog as neither of us spoke.

“I’m blind, and in order to read, I use Braille. I thought you had realized that upon seeing how large my book was.”

My body shut down, unwilling to react to such a blow. This girl was blind just like me, yet she was unclosed from living life. She taught me so much with just her speech. She lived unclosed from reality; I lived but to be shut off in my own world, and here she sat extending her world within my grasp. I did not have to live a life closed off from those around me. I was blinded by my own blindness and now my eyes were unclosed.