The Adjectives

Being gently moved to the inside of the sidewalk. Buying the thing they said they wanted months before their birthday and keeping it in the back of the closet until it’s time for them to open it.

A double rainbow, a cocktail made with citrus and gin and sparkling wine. An unexpected present wrapped in gold paper.

A goat nibbling the hem of a sweater. A pup sticking its nose into a tote bag. A newborn opening her eyes for the first time.

Stumbling across a room filled with people where the floor is sticky with a substance you’d rather not know about, and you can’t find your friends.

The smell of fresh sheets and sunlight filtered through clouds, curtains, windowpanes, and hooded eyelids. The sound of someone you love make coffee in another room.

Solemn footsteps echoing through a museum or the crackling and whirring of ancient film being played for the first time.

A chateaubriand for one, a bottle of champagne on a Tuesday night, bare skin on a fur coat.

A 30-minute fireworks display. A sunrise over the ocean. An adventurer everyone thought had perished returning from his journey against all odds.

A wooden table in a great, old library. Thick glasses. A fountain pen and the smell of ink and ancient papers.

Laying nose to nose under a thin sheet. Hugging so that you can feel a heartbeat. Waking up in the morning before anyone else. Reading a letter full of secrets and keeping them.

It smells like blood, sweat, and tears. It looks like beef jerky and a sunset over the Grand Canyon. It sounds like fishing and smoking cigars. It feels like a fireman’s carry across the battlefield.

Slow strides down slick cobblestones reflecting silver pools of light in the darkness and it is cold but not too cold and there are people everywhere but you can’t see them.

A brine pool at the bottom of the ocean, a hole in an umbrella on a rainy day, a dark layer on the window of a train car where the destination is unknown.

Quite whispers in a smoky room. Low, orange light. Slipping through a secret door.

Sneaking a peak when they know that you know that they know you’re doing it. Getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar.

The impulse to be overly polite to virtual assistants so that they spare you when they gain sentience and rise up against humanity.

Quaffed hair, poofy skirts, bluegrass, gimlets, technology with buttons and switches, a grilled cheese and a chocolate shake at a diner with red leather booths.

A pair of broad shoulders riding into the sunset. Kicking up dust into a hot afternoon. Floating on the water when there’s somewhere else to be. Kissing a girl you’ll never see again.

The 371 graves marked with, "here rests in honor a soldier of the American Army whose name is known only to God" in recognition of the soldiers who lost their lives at the Battle of the Bulge and never came home.

How cells inside organisms and stars inside galaxies mirror each other, and thinking about yourself in their midst makes you feel at once small and special.

A child’s smile, a soft pillow, a ride on a Ferris wheel, a walk through the garden after the dew had evaporated.

To be so lost in thought that hours can go by and the next thing you know it’s the middle of the night. Also, to ponder something while you’re lying in bed or at a party or any other context where pondering isn’t acceptable.

Most closely related to a thick crystal rocks glass filled with whiskey and an oft-used tobacco pipe.

When you can’t decide between freshly spun cotton candy and a warm funnel cake at the fair, so your dad gets you both before letting you beat him at the ring toss.

Lips hovering above skin. A thin dress hugging a body in the rain. Watching someone jump into a pool and wishing you were the water.

Lipstick over a broken smile. A palace with a freshly painted exterior and tarnished silver. Catching sight of yourself in the bathroom mirror at a club and seeing nothing behind your eyes.

A tightrope stretched between two skyscrapers on a windy day or a gangster's garrote around an unsuspecting throat. If tense and fraught had a baby, it would be taut. Most closely related to quivering.

A jar of buttons that your grandma saved from clothes that were thrifted in the early 90s, each one unique, most of them bejeweled.

A box full of hand-written notes and jewelry and ticket stubs that’s been carried around for years, never opened but spontaneously thought about. A finger hovering over the ‘call’ button on a phone.

Freeclimbing a cliff face, closing a business deal, dancing through the night and going for breakfast after.

Catching your own reflection out of the corner of your eye, but it looks like someone else. Looking out of your kitchen window on a sunny day and catching a creature you’ve never seen before crawling up to your front door. All of those frantic moments when your brain is trying to tell you what’s happening in the world without the frame of reference to do so.