If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading
The legacies people leave behind in you.
My handwriting is the same style as the teacher’s who I had when I was nine. I’m now twenty one and he’s been dead eight years but my i’s still curve the same way as his.
I watched the last season of a TV show recently but I started it with my friend in high school. We haven’t spoken in four years.
I make lentil soup through the recipe my gran gave me.
I curl my hair the way my best friend showed me.
I learned to love books because my father loved them first.
How terrifying, how excruciatingly painful to acknowledge this. That I am a jigsaw puzzle of everyone I have briefly known and loved. I carry them on with me even if I don’t know it. How beautiful.
Polaris, The North Star
You had to let go of something great Of something that could have been Worth the wait But I dislike For you have always been right That we did need this break Since realizations have come to the surface That we deserve not to tolerate
It was indeed for the best of us. One should not sacrifice their dreams and lean too much on uncertainty. The other should not let their uncertainty be molded, sacrificed as a pleaser, or become too influenced into the dreamer’s dreams. None deserves the extent of pain. So, beloved, may you find a person whose dreams align with yours and form a bond so covalent that it won’t ever equate to the pang of our heartbreak. I will be rooting and cheering for you in the tiny corner of your heart, mind, body, and soul. For our mere platonic love is a rarity—a gift. Perhaps, in due time, when our hearts mend and stop the search of our lost potentials—our could’ve been’s—and our hearts learn selflessly nothing but the true happiness of one another, then our friendship can be restored.
Because I would love to just have a conversation with you about existence and other insane topics that late poets have talked about.
— The Final Apology and the Chance of Reconciliation
to brush most people's probing aside
is effortless, deflecting blows so they never see you - I've had to catch myself noticing people in weak moments. they make you feel like some unfathomable pillar
created by something ancient or alien, or maybe just yourself.
I despise the predatory element,
a weakness seen
that could blend in better -
now it’s something kind,
learning what makes people tick. I wonder if other people like me exist
building fortresses of knowledge
no one suspects we possess -
I catch myself studying people,
watching from outside the circle
of normal human interaction.
it’s not malicious,
just different -
a compulsion maybe, or just curiosity distilled into methodical observation.
it started as survival,
now I notice the pause before a practiced lie,
the subtle shift in posture when someone feels threatened -
all these blaring, bright neon signs I used to try to mimic.
sometimes I wonder if they can tell
I’m building libraries of their expressions,
cataloging their reactions
and how they signal belonging - it’s exhausting work.
sometimes I catch someone watching me,
an eye-meet, wonder-if they’re like me moment, or if they just sense something off
and wrong -
we were constellations once,
maybe now there’s just a slight delay
in recognition,
while I wonder if they’re like me
collecting a moment for too long.
Saul Leiter
Untitled, n.d
Two women conduct marksmanship training at Roosevelt High School, Los Angeles, 1942.