I heard you once, twice, and three times over. I told you what you wanted to hear and you recorded it picture by picture. You played it back for me like a silent film on a movie screen. It took some time and you took the time for it. When it was finished it still wasn’t right but it was close enough that it cried for me and I drank its tears like fine wine. A stroke of your pen and you gave it its face. A wry smile played on its lips at first but then it turned to a frown as it realized how long it would be nothing but a face. It wished to know if it would be tall or short or fat or strong. It wanted to know if your words would make it soft or sharp whether it would comfort or wound. Though your words flowed they took too long and it cried for the not knowing.

All at once it withered and died and as hard as you tried it wouldn’t breathe again. Not until you gave it a kiss and you shocked it to life, but its heartbeat was weak and your words were strong and you could only thank God that it wasn’t dead long. If you had forgotten what it was like while it was alive then you could never expect it to grow or strive. You only prayed now that it could still survive. You loved it and wrote it and built it from scratch, but now you feel like a turtle that’s caught on its back.

You left it alone with no title for a name. It is lost and unloved and dreadfully confused. It trusted you and clung to you. You created it then let it free without a name so that when someone asked it had absolutely nothing to tell them. It never moved past the point of first starting. It was caught and lost with all the other forgotten gum drops. It wandered and squandered for some place to go, but it’ll never travel because it will never know . . . It’s name.