My life, so far, is written on flat surfaces that can absorb ink or lead. This is what I realised, going through pieces of paper covered with my handwriting, and as usual, not being able to throw anything away. At the back of receipts. At the back of smudge-inked photographs. Old journals. On book margins. On empty wax-lined paper cups from the dreaded Starbucks (beware of this multinational coffecompany), complete with teethmarks at the rim, bearing the evidence of either restless boredom or caffeine overdose.
More and more still. we’re not different from animals; from snakes in particular: we rub our bellies against the warm earth, we shed our skin wherever we go.
What we leave behind is skin. Outer layers that disguise inner turmoil. Skin. Skin all around; like a dancer shedding her skin on stage, a writer with prose dancing in his eyes, a doctor leaving his fingerprints on his patient’s back as he examines, a child dragging a crayon across the walls.
Whoever said stripping was revealing; to me it seems that leaving traces makes you more naked than just wearing skin.
