Tricks of the Eye

She sees him in every surface.

Sometimes she turns her head quickly and his face appears in the crowd, but when she looks closer he disappears and she's staring at someone else's unfamiliar face; sometimes when she's looking out the window of the bus, the back of a stranger's head can suddenly become his and for an instant she loves - knows - that stranger, and then he turns away and reverts back to the original so that the moment of recognition escapes her grasp and she breathes in only air.

At times a wall can remind her of his leg; a painting bears close resemblance to his eyes; the curve of a bridge she might liken to his smile; a building call to mind his chest. At times a single flower breathes his breath; the midnight traffic echoes his whisper; all the universe is every part of him and she can see them, everything, one at a time.

He is everywhere, but he is never really there. She knows every part of him - can count his hairs, can trace the lines of his skin, can pick out his back from a throng of people - and yet, she has never really known him at all.

It's just tricks of the eye.