I exist in Jane Austen.

Emma, Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park.

I exist in Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116.

I exist in books I’ve never read,

Movies I’ve never seen.

In Catcher in the Rye, Anna Karenina, The Power of Now.

Martin Scorsese flows in my veins,

Edward Scissorhands across my eyes.

I exist in rhyme and inflection and dramatic irony.

In the pen scratching across a course in English.

In a paint brush.

I exist in the fate of Sisyphus and the absurdity of Camus.

My eyes tell the tale of Scout as she treks to the home of Holmes,

Sherlock, that is.

I exist betwixt the pages of my dreams.

But, most importantly, I exist.