So it is that a human life is not so much a being in a body, as it is the ripples of the acts and inhibitions in the lives of living beings and the world. The ripples of acts in time and hearts. Of inhibitions. Of words spoken, and left unspoken. Of responses, reactions, pauses, silences. In waves of beings outward from the moments of our lives. Like a cloud in other lives and moments. If this self in my body is real, that self must also be real.

The mountain is a tracery of stars in the sky; the cloud is a stone in my hand.