Aspiration, n.2

Aspiration, n.2 Connor McDonald

Afternoon in the wet to resolve a message about papers needed for financial aid. The papers were submitted two weeks ago, and the automated message a mistake, which has now been corrected on three separate occasions. I learned today that financial aid will continue to be necessary; after receiving good grades from Legal Research and Writing, my GPA will remain high enough to maintain scholarships.

bygone chances cherry blossoms falling with the rain

The returned assignment also contained a mistake: the use of “canister” and “cannister” within the same sentence – a single hair that ruins the meal – causing me to clench my fists near my ears; the deep red imprints of fingertips seeming excessive, an act from the ego aspiring to some sense of perfection.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines aspiration as the process of drawing breath. Again, I find confirmation in Kafka: afire with fever and left gasping for air from tuberculosis; he requested Max Brod consign his manuscripts to the same fate. It must be characteristic of the type that gravitates toward law . . . to be drawn in by the mistakes of our aspiration(s).

smoldering the curled wings of mothlight