The Texture of Sushi

Salmon is cool on my tongue, and sweet. No matter how I try to remember, its smoothness is always a pleasant surprise, the creaminess of the fatty ripples a decadent treat.

You can never know what someone else is thinking--across the table, across the street, across the ocean. No matter the glimmers of light that beacon--occasionally, intermittently, consistently--another person's mind is always the darkness over the unbridged chasm. All I can know is the taste of the salmon, and the metallic coolness of my keys as I press my fingers against them to make sure I am there.

If your mind runs away, she tells me, grab your keys. Run your finger along the jagged edges. Look at the keychains. Touch them. Your mind will come back.

It is true. My mind travels, but when my senses call, it comes running.

I can never know another's thoughts, and why would I want to? If ever we could truly share a brain, we'd not desire so blindingly to share our bodies.

Perspective whispers in my ear: even and until then, there's no denying a shared acre of heart. In a world in which all I thought I could be sure of was the texture of sushi, that little assurance is a sweet surprise.