Why Does Life Exist If Only To Be Snuffed Out? What Purpose Is There In The Temporary But Pain.

A sudden calm washed over me

I felt no need to rush

To the finish line, to the next milestone, to anything ever again

My heart quieted for the first time in a long time

And beat gently in my chest, the way a child’s hand is held by her mother’s.

I need a new wardrobe—I’m running out of time to be young and beautiful. For people to see me and not just look at me out of some mundane politeness. I need to be everything I am right now in these fleeting moments, or it’s like they’ve already gone.

These teeth of mine, that I press my tongue against, will outlast my soul. I taste death, how when I die, my crooked jaw will linger here on this earth without me. It haunts me to smile and see a glimpse of what will remain.

She caressed her lover’s hair like a bird tending her nest; she saw only futures in the black tangles clinging to her fingers.

You wouldn’t understand it, you aren’t a mimic. I miss crawling into other people’s skin because I feel more comfortable there. Sir John of Kistchire’s outrageous ski slope nose and eyebrows so furry birds mistake them for caterpillars, or Miss Browden’s pursed cherry red lips clinging for dear life at the end of her chin; they feel like second homes to me.

Why can’t you just be yourself?

I told you, you wouldn’t understand. I can be outrageous as Sir John when I’m him, I can be as persnickety and secretive as Miss Browden when I’m her. When I’m just, me, I’m. I’m nothing.

Most people don’t need a wardrobe of skins to feel at ease you know. Of course I wouldn’t understand you. You’re ununderstandable.

I’ll show you ununderstandable. I’ll take these eyes and strain them brown, I’ll take this hair and stretch it into a long flaxen rope just like yours. Though I don’t know how to braid, so we may look different still.

Do not wear my face. Ever.

Afraid of what you’ll see if I do?

My skin prickles hot; I asked the old man a question and he answers with a story so far unrelated I had to turn around and see just who in the hell he was talking to, because it certainly wasn’t me! Yes or no will do just fine, I kept hearing myself say in my mind, my voice gentle like a kitten’s fighting tooth and nail to drown out his gravely droning on about airplanes and the war. Outwardly I must’ve been screeching fake niceties and not pulling off my polite half assed head nods because his eyes were wide, and albeit dull as ever but he seemed perturbed. And that’s saying something because men like Robert don’t seem anything, they’re simply half dead elderly men roaming the earth to challenge God. Look how long I’m living! Keep knocking Jesus, I’m not opening the door! I can’t imagine being a gold digger and accidentally marrying a Robert. Undying so much as they are unriveting. Later I looked in a mirror and saw my face, still plastered up fake happy from our little conversation if you could call it that. I understood instantly why he seemed so off-put by me, I looked clinically insane. This fake it til you make it crap has got to work for somebody but it is undoubtedly not me. Unfortunately God put me here to be as authentic as possible—to punish me of course.

Melodic, melismatic is she. Her song is her figure dancing in air, steam rising ever out of reach.

Art by alayne

Hands wrapped around my neck squeeze tighter. I wonder if this is how I will die. My eyes bulge but I see nothing but black splotches and bright stars. Night has followed me into day, just as I dreaded it would. Just as I dreaded it would.

It is relieving to write what I think. I hadn't realized how ravenous and independent thoughts can be when left to their own endeavors. They can swarm behind the eyes so fiercely that they may pop out. And perhaps that would be a good thing, for a dangling eye can see oneself from an outside perspective, and not one manufactured and manhandled by pesky buzzing thoughts.