The Chair

The chair binds me, neuropathy hums; past trails fuel words in a still life’s sanctuary.

The Chair
My ink drips, and the page responds—calling on its sisters to carry the words onto the page. The page holds the nectar, my words; when you read, you drink the essence of my mind, my Soul; it's poured out for all the world to see.

This chair is my weathered tether, my friend that creaks beneath me. Its leather is cracked like the Earth under a relentless Sun. The armrests are smoothed by years of my palms' restless grip, and they carry the faint scent of linseed oil and time. Its scent is a musk that clings to the air of this small room. Neuropathy dances in my hands, a thousand pins prickling, each finger a stranger twitching against the pen I clutch. From the waist down, my body is a ghost—numb within, heavy, a map of absence where sensation once roamed, yet supersensitive on the surface. The spinal stimulator hums in my back, a faint pulse or a heavy vibration, my choice. Its battery is slipped between layers of my skin in my back, like a stone lodging in soft Earth, a weight I feel when I shift; however, its edges sharp in my mind's grasp. The room hums too, a quiet chorus dancing to the faint flicker of LED lights, its light pouring across my desk, which is cluttered with dog-eared notebooks and the stain of coffee rings. The taste of medium-roast coffee lingers on my tongue, as bitter as the hours I spend here, pinned by a body that no longer answers correctly. Yet this chair, this prison, is my sanctuary too—a cradle holding the stone where the ink of words spills out. It's my trail now.

Wyoming whispers back, with memories as sharp as morning frost. I was a wanderer once, boots crunching gravel on trails that snaked through the South and West, from Smoky Mountain hollows to Sierra ridges. For a decade, I drank the wild's breath—pine sap's sharp tang, river water cold as steel on my lips, the low moan of wind through cedars. The land was my Mistress, and I wandered over her body like oil, seeking every hill and hidden recess. I had opportunities to speak with rocks and to listen to their silence, which was heavier than my words. Some days, I could sing with cold, crystal streams while they carved their secrets into stone streambeds. I lived a life of paradise, and the land was my page—with dust and sweat—the foundation of my ink.

One night in the Wind River Range, I fought with death's shadow. Six wolves, lean and hungry, trailed me through the pines; their eyes were eerie-like glowing embers lit by my torch in the dusk. I'd been careless, left my food scraps half-buried, and the wind betrayed me, carrying my scent like a summons. Their first howl froze my blood, and then the soft crunch of pine needles under their paws sent me scrambling up a gnarled tree, sap sticking to my palms, its sticky, bitter sting sharp in my nose. If I try, I can still imagine the faint smell in my mind.

Perched fifteen feet up, I clung to the pine, its bark biting my skin; the sway of branches became a cruel lullaby. Below, the wolves circled, gray ghosts with yellow eyes—their patience a blade honed by instinct. Their growls wove a low hymn, wafting through the chill air, and my breath fogged, thick with fear's metallic tang. My pack dangled uselessly from a branch, my knife out of reach, and my legs cramped as hours bled into the night. They didn't lunge, didn't claw—just waited, knowing time was their ally. Dawn crept in, gray and thin, painting the ridge in a frail light. One by one, they slipped back into the forest as if bored of their game. I slid down, my knees trembling, my boots hitting the dirt with a thud that tasted like victory. My hands scraped raw and carried the tree sap for days, a scar of survival etched into my skin. I'd danced on the sharp edge—and lived to roam another day.

Now, this chair holds me like that pine once did, but there's no dawn to free me. The stimulator's hum is my new wolf howl, a reminder of a body no longer fully mine. I'm a Borg now; my fingers, tingling with neuropathy's fire, trace lines on paper instead of trails. The room's air is still, heavy with the scent of ink and old wood, unlike the Wyoming wind that carried the cries of wolves. I taste the dry ache of pills swallowed to dull the pain, feel the chair's worn cushion mold to my spine, its support a faint echo of Earth underfoot. The clock's tick is my rhythm, steady where my pulse falters. Yet, my pen moves, scratching out stories, each word a step on a path I forge from this stillness. I embrace my writer's world with the same passion I once embraced my previous Mistress, with love and affection for her beauty and desire for her allure to my senses.

That Wyoming night and others taught me patient endurance, a lesson this chair demands daily. I was once a man who ran from wolves, who befriended squirrels with shelled pecans and drank from streams, who stole the land's words and wove them into dreams. Now, my dreams spill onto paper, born in the quiet of this room where light slants through a UV-filmed window. The chair's leather creaks, a sound as familiar as my own breath, and the battery in my back shifts, a silent partner in this tethered life. I write of rivers I'll never wade again, of rocks whose weight I'll never lift, but each sentence is a trail blazed, a wild place claimed. The wolves are gone, their howls a memory, but my words stalk the page, fierce and alive, proving I'm still here, still dancing on the edge. One day in the future, I will succumb to the dust—not today. Today, I'll scratch fire across a page with my magnesium pen, dripping ink and igniting the mind.

—Noisy Wren, ‘25