Delve by Paul Hostovsky I want to go deeper, all the way down to the cellar of the house I grew up in. I go there in my head, the same head that easily cleared the low ceiling above the dark, narrow staircase, the lightswitch on the left, the banister beginning halfway down on the right, the aluminum nosing of the treads groaning metallically as I take the steps one at a time, counting them as I go: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight–I think there were ten altogether, though I could be overshooting it or undershooting it. I can’t remember exactly but I can imagine (imagination is memory) the exact feel of the newel—small, rounded, wooden— and the squeak-rub sound it makes as I grasp it briefly like the hand of a dance partner and twirl myself around it, jumping off the last step with a flourish and landing on the linoleum tiles of the floor of the basement of my childhood, the furnace room (fire-breathing, verboten) to the left, the laundry room (sweet-smelling, white) to the right, and one central cylindrical vertical pole silently supporting everything above. I put my arms around it lovingly. I clamp my legs around it tightly. And I embrace it like a fire pole, replacing my tight grip with a looser grip to allow myself to descend.
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You sure took me on your journey.
How is it possible? This is the exact same cellar from my youth, and of my own experience too. Well done.