Distance2Desire — writing by Max Bochman

Loading A luminous orange sunset over a dark seaA luminous orange sunset over a dark sea

WHAT2DOABOUTLOVE

Long nights that seem to end before I’ve had time to say my prayers. I’m still learning how to tell the difference between a feeling that needs an answer and one that only needs room.

If I could isolate these thoughts, perhaps they would stop pretending to be instructions. For now I’m practicing attention: looking directly at a thing without asking it to become simple.

I used to think certainty was a place you could arrive. Lately it feels more like weather—something moving across the water, briefly changing every surface it touches.

There are moments when the walls seem to close in and the room becomes a coffin. Then a window opens, almost by accident, and the world returns with all of its unfinished edges.

I had this unexplainable feeling that somewhere else was where I needed to be. Maybe distance is not the opposite of desire. Maybe it is the shape desire takes while it is still becoming legible.