Time Keeps Passing, I Fight Hard For Change. It Does Not Yield To Me, Wind Against A Mountain. I Carry

I feel pressure to act not as a person, but as woman. To fill every void left by our absence, too little leaders of us, too little comedians of us, too little scientists of us; am I meant to choose what loss to make up for with just my one life?

I want to know peace for while, if that’s alright. If the world can spare it for someone like me.

I felt a twinge at first in my stomach, like I’d eaten bad crab, only worse. Like I’d eaten two bad crabs. Horrendous to even imagine. As my god unraveled me by an invisible umbilical cord leading back to him, my skin loosened and bones leaned on each other like the limbs of a wooden puppet. Weirdly hollow, with a sudden cacophony of clatter, I simply disappeared. I come to you now as a memory. A ghost, maybe. Or a cloud of events so positively stupid and unyielding that not even a god could get rid of it. I’m sure you’re wondering how I pissed off a god I so dutifully doted on for years on end to the point of being turned to dust, I must tell you, the reasons are long and each grow more foolish than the last. It began the day I blamed god. And he blamed me back.

Remembering him is like biting glass. I don’t know why I do it, why I keep hurting myself on the sharp details of his shattered memory. His eyes, such a pale blue, had a depth to them you wouldn’t expect like stagnant ocean water. My mouth bleeds as I masticate his face, the way words would leave his mouth; his voice is like rows of pins in my tongue. I can’t help myself but to recall him, over and over again, no matter the pain. I think that’s what draws me to recollection actually, feeling anything again. It’s the numbness that lets you drift into autopilot, living while asleep, that ruins you so much more deeply. Losing a loved one, and yourself along with them.

How does a siren know your song? The proper words, the perfect intonation to pull you from the safety of your vessel into the sea? It is no small task, tainting minds with tongue, but a siren knows this well. Every sailor she devours shares with her his innermost desires, simply by being eaten. His mind is consumed by her, his memories dissolved and swallowed. Internalized. And when you’ve had one man, you’ve had them all. Or so she thought.

-Diary of a Siren

In another world, I am strong. And withstanding, and sure of myself. I pray she’s well, for I certainly am not.

Why do the ones I love keep being taken from me? What have I done to deserve shards of their memory pricking my fingertips like spindles every time I scroll on my phone and see a face that has stolen a piece of them? Their eyes on someone else’s head, their smile creasing someone else’s cheeks, their ginger hair curling around someone else’s ears that don’t fucking look right! I hate that I see you everywhere. I hate more that it’s never you.

It’s easier for the caterpillar to die than to grow wings. You cannot choose ease when splendor demands difficulty.

Remembering him is like getting to know a shard of glass. I push my finger tip down gingerly into his jagged profile and draw tears; he is not whole anymore. He will never be whole again. I could sip tea at my window sill and watch the clouds roll on, but I prefer to live on the edges of his memory. I prefer to dwell in my scrapbooks and peak into his diaries, peeling back the brokenness of disappearance into the smoothness of understanding. Floating in the ether I am pricked again by the knowledge that no matter how deeply I learn of his soul, I cannot unplunge him from the river styx. And I am content to keep hurting, I am content to keep pressing my soft body into the recesses of his absence, if it will only bring me closer to his place in nothing. I am content in that.

16 years old, five people around my table, two legs, and no bombs. I eat dinner with my family and we laugh at my dad dropping Qidreh on his chest. He looks at me with an embarrassed smile and I hand him a cloth to wipe himself with. 16 years old, one person around my table, one and a half legs, one bomb. My dad amputates my leg as I lay on the dinner table. He looks at me with anguish and I cry out to him as I feel every cut he makes. There is no anesthesia, there is no hospital for me to go to, my father the surgeon looks out of place operating in our family home. But my leg must come off, and the laughter of past dinners must quiet to allow for my screams. 16 years old, one leg, too many bombs to count. I clench my jaw to keep quiet as my father changes my leg’s dressing. He looks at me with apologetic eyes and I hand him a cloth to wipe my wound with. 16 years old, one leg, and one hope left: to make it to 17.