The Cut
I wonder if you will ever know the damage you’ve caused. It’s been a year, but in my soul the time where we existed together seems like the only reality I’ve ever known. Everything now seems hollow in comparison and lacking reason or sense of purpose...Will it always be this way? It’s almost funny, so many times we discussed which one of us would flake from this relationship. If i’m being honest I always believed it would have been me. True enough, it was the punch I didn’t see coming…It was you…I fucking hate you for it. So much so that I laugh and cry at the same time, the insanity of the moment creating suffocation within me. Believe you me I’ve tried to forget you. I’ve gone out with my friends; I’ve picked up hobbies, and even turned to religion for comfort. Did you know I even tried kissing another girl just the other day? Her name was Alice. She was sweet, beautiful, and certainly more agreeable than you ever were. By any standard a ten if there ever was one. Yet, I left her all together after that kiss. Nothing tasted more bitter on my lips. Nothing offended my eyes more. Nothing broke me quite as deep than painfully being aware she wasn’t you. Where ever I go, whatever I do, your the reminder that something will forever be missing. There are days were I muster the strength to look at the old oak tree in the field. You remember the one?…I still chuckle thinking of the night of the famous One-Star show. You laid at the feet of that tattered old oak, like a child whose about to see their first firework; the anticipation of magic in your eyes waiting for a sky full of stars to shine in splendor. Yet there was only one. Not even the moon was full. By all means a disappointment by any who knew better, but not you, your eyes stared at that one star as if you were looking at the face of God. Never disappointed, and in that one moment making me realize just how much I loved you. You didn’t see the world the same way I did which is why I needed you near me. My colors grew ever brighter from your light…I dare admit I still need you…So much so that now I lay at the feet of that tattered old tree, and I look for that one star among a sky of millions. When I find it I stare it, much like you did. Only it’s not God I see, but you; it’s not magic I feel, but an endless grief. I will burn this letter after it is written. With eyes welled up, within me never grew the strength to admit and accept; that the moment my life ended was the day you……
Battering
I did not rely on anyone.
I cared for few, aside those tied to me by blood and even then it was an impossible feat attempted over decades.
I kept friend briefly- never wholeheartedly because they were slippery, like soap on oiled flesh. Impossible to keep, and impossible to trust. Even with Dawn.
I was content detesting the idea of trusting my heart to anyone, drawn to the sugary liquor pressing to my lips instead.
I have kept it safe for years, after all, and batted away so many easily. Some clung to the impossibility of reaching me but were quick to release their grip upon iron spikes protruding from my flesh where heat should breed.
I never understood why they had ben battered into place, but perhaps my body knew
the plebeian masses would try to tarnish such a polish I had blessed it with.
But tonight I stand on a lever, with a bat blood-dipped and loosely held over my shoulder.
I stare in shock, that someone would manage to climb the wall. Barbs do not seem to wound you, where so many have become grotesquely disfigured in their advances.
You smile brightly- warm and cutting in this frigid world. You seem not to feel the creeping of disparity in my stead and I fear you never will.
I fear it, because everyone is afraid or I am at the very least able to sense it thumping beneath the surface of their smarmy grin: flicker, waver. How am I not to fear the inevitable?
You do not though. You waved at my turrets, and skipped toward the fences. My guards- myself shaded in varying years- watched you go in disbelief, guns loose in their shaking grip. You made my warriors flicker, fearing.
No one makes me shake. No one makes my castle tremble- yet there you stand, bright eyed and wind-battered with the hope of Gods in your eyes.
You will be the death of me, I am sure, as I clutch at the layers covering my chest. I feel a dark gaze penetrate its forces; feel your thousand yard stare that beckons for my trust and at the same time the plug to my life preserver is pulled.
I fell foolishly to my knees to the witch with a decadent grin, and can only pray to the dark deities that might still hear my forlorn prayers you do not deceive me.
Burning Bush
Gravel crunches under my tires and I look for that Jeep in the parking lot. I know that must be you hunched over at a picnic table down by the still water; you never learned to properly dress for the cold. I sit silently, keys in hand, for one long minute. You flip the pages of a heavy book, and if I know you at all, it’s a Bible. If you would make some recognizable gesture, I’d be sure.
The trout pond, at 5:15. My throat is raw, and my face swollen, but no tears come now. You said you’d be there early, just like our second or third date, when you were falling in love with a woman for the first time. Back then, I was always tired and always lonely, but fiercely optimistic. My wrists were thin as a child’s, and I didn’t know then the difference between sickness and sin— I told you that I had the same sickness as your mother, who never loved you.
“Well, I think you could use somebody.”
“I think we both could.”
It was May the 20th, and we didn’t get around to fishing that day. All summer, we mastered the art of getting lost, your wheezing laugh giving me wrong directions on Route 122. Brain fog was something endearing.
Now it is winter, same time and place, and already dusk. Leaving the safety of my car and making my way down to where you sit by the pond feels like tying myself to the whipping post. I thought closure was what I wanted. Since I’ve already grieved, I can’t turn down your unmarked road anymore. That much, I understand.
Coming to meet you is like visiting a grave. But when I approach, your cheeks are rosy, and your hair is dark and wet on your brow. You look less like a ghost than I’d hoped.
“How are you,” I venture. I know full well you’re frayed as I am.
“I’m good,” your hand over that Bible like an oath.
“Where we left off felt very final.”
“I feel encouraged, though,” you breathe.
I wait for your explanation. After the pain I’ve caused you, the least I can do is shut up and try to understand.
“You know, when I asked you to pray about it, did you?” I nod, because I really did.
Your eyes are glassy. “…because before I even got to Josh’s house yesterday, Russ of all people texted me out of the blue. He said, ‘Marriage is too important to let someone’s little sin stand in the way.’ I told him, ‘You don’t know how big this is.’”
You look at me expectantly. Gratitude trembles my lips before I can speak it.
We’re not married, but I get your point. This was your God giving you a sign that it’s okay for you to change your mind. And from the way your mouth full of braces is smiling at me again, a sign is all you needed.
Happens that fast
She slipped away. It happened so quickly. I had just seen her earlier that day, I knew it would happen. I prayed it wouldn't. But it did.
My mom was my best friend. I told her everything. She helped me through so much.
One June day she had a heart attack, twenty four hours later she had a stroke. At that moment, everything changed. She would go on fighting for 2 years. I think she got tired and didn't want to suffer anymore. One quiet night in July she slipped away. And once again, in that moment everything changed.
I felt everthing changed for me in 2015, when I had a very severe depression, and I have hit the rock bottom, as they say. My worldview shifted; to be honest though, I just had the courage to make a leap towards what my experience has led me and embraced my contradictory nature. It is curious how often the inner events shape us more than the tragedies of our lives, which is the case for me, anyway; the worst moments are the one when suffering arises in you like a gigantic monster surfacing from the bottom of the ocean, a demon whose presence was always unsuspected and repressed.
The Buddy Willard Chronicles
Buddy Willard asked Esther Greenwood: Who are you going to marry now, now that you've been... here? He motions to the well-kept grounds of McLean Hospital, which isn't specifically mentioned by name in her famous novel, but is where Sylvia Plath got her inspiration for The Bell Jar.
I just finished reading The Bell Jar, having read it once before a long time ago. I am familiar with the notion of a man asking me who I would marry 'now', 'now' being after my stint somewhere secret, somewhere unsavory. I sat on a man's lap once and he asked me that, and I felt something like interest towards him - that someone could be so casual about locked wards and sickness, as if life ever really exists outside of that. But also, how sinister it is to dismiss someone because they have suffered in a stigmatized way.
I remember the rejections, how the men would say, "I didn't want to tell you this over the phone," and they would break up with me in crowded bars in front of their friends. I have taken Ubers home, numb and inconsolable, and I have spent time dissecting my actions and words. At another point in The Bell Jar, Buddy Willard, Esther Greenwood's old boyfriend, asks her if it is 'him' who 'makes women crazy', as he had dated her and another girl at the mental hospital.
Going back to sitting on that man's lap, the one who told me we couldn't "really date" because I had "been in the hospital," I think of how idiotic that sentiment is. That we can make each other crazy, or be crazy, or have people judge us for being crazy. It's so stigmatized, this business of mental illness. I can gratefully say I have not seen that man in years.
The moment everything changed was when I could look back on this man, who I had at one point loved very much, and think of him not as better than me for not having suffered in a hospital, but as lesser than me, for putting me down.
Reflecting on The Bell Jar, and stints at McLean Hospital, is hard. It hits close to home. But the moment everything changes is the moment you realize you deserve better than men who judge you for it.
the light overruled the darkness
The moment everything changed...
I was hurt crying all day, hurt that i may never met anyone, then i met him.
He texted me out of no where didn't know who he was. I answered him i was hurting I was looking for a friend nothing more, but as soon as we started talking as more than friends, the weight was lifted off my shoulders, I met someone who changed me entirely, He understood me, he looked at me the way someone does in the movies, he changed me, he made me realize that it's okay for me to be myself, he complimented me. He said that he will help me find myself again. And he did so much i'm so thankful that i met him and my whole world changed. I was always misunderstood until I met him. Instead of leaving me after giving him my trust I told him about my past and about whats wrong with me. Instead, of leaving he had stayed. We are closer than before. So ya of course i'm different i have been changed entirely and i'm glad I am.
Apocalypse For The Mayans
A young boy standing still with a teddy bear on his right hand and half-eaten vegan chocolate chip cookies on the table. He looked through the window and he always liked the vacation home, far away from the city, and bustling with wild animals, a sea of trees and a vista of grass and the distant mountains.
He moved the books, the pillows and his blanket off the sofa and stood on the seat to get a better look out the window. He could see a herd of sheep, an old Volkswagen car parked near the pond and his parents sitting next to each other on the swing. Both of them were quiet.
The boy walked down from the sofa to the floor and picked up his blanket with him to the entrance door. Walking on the creaky wooden flooring slowly, the boy felt something was very wrong. He was young, yet he knew many things that only adults would only know, or so he thought of himself.
He stood in front of the maple door, that was twice his size, and gazed at the markings on the surface of the door; many of which were drawings from his and his sister's crayons. The golden bulbous handle decorated the door, but he was too short to reach for it. He pushed the loose door forwards and it opened with a loud creak.
Both of his parents immediately turned their heads and his mother ran to him hurriedly. She picked him up and started to caress his forehead. The boy, feeling surprised, started to cry without reason. His mother started to kiss the boy's head and swing him gently on her arms. His mother then turned to her husband.
"It's okay, baby.. Everything is going to be okay." She whispered to his ears. "Everything is going to be okay." The boy cried and cried without knowing why.