familiar
My fingers are wrapped firmly around the base of the paint brush, I squat down and dip it back into the paint once again, I’m on repeat, I stand back up and ready myself to climb the stool and cover the next wooden panel carefully. I can feel my vision narrowing, black spots expanding temporarily. I’m dizzy, maybe thirsty? Maybe just tired. I’m in a mode where I should rest, but I can’t stop moving. It doesn’t concern me much, I’m used to this. It’s a familiar feeling. My heart beating a bit harder, my breath slightly shallow.
But then suddenly something else creeps up on me. It’s familiar as well, but I haven’t felt it in so long it immediately shakes me up. How long has it been, old friend?
Everything I do feels rushed, I have to concentrate hard on slowing down. But my mind starts to tingle when it perceives my every move in slow motion.
The loudness of voices all at once, an ominous warning that something terrible has happened. “Everything is fine,” I remind myself. “I’m okay.”
I’m slipping, everything feels broken, everything feels like it’s falling apart, nothing will ever be right again, the world is on fire and there’s an urgency and feeling of helplessness because I’m just standing here in the hallway holding a paint brush.
“I’m okay,” I repeat to myself, shaking my head and taking in deep breaths of air.
Was that how to do it?
A drop of cold paint slowly bled through my sock. I’m okay.
will
In my mind, there’s a place we go.
Where we don’t know, but we will. I picture myself in the midst of a crowd, not knowing. It’s safe to not know. I’m safe, I’m surrounded by the people who can tell me I know everything I need. I do, like I always have. So I’m free.
They know, and I know. So I dance, like there’s no tomorrow. I dance, like I’m safe. I can feel my pulse doing overtime. The beat shaking my bones, vibrating through my core, I’m swaying and swayed. I trust you, I always have.
But then, goosebumps, there’s a presence I can’t pinpoint, but I can feel it. But then, a shadow fills my soul. Fills the room. Grabs my hips. Moves me, through space and time. Swallows me whole.
But then, we’re dark. We’re wrong, we’re twisted. We are dangerous. But that’s not true. You’re dangerous.
Where’s my will?
currents
Find me here, where I’m hidden from plain sight - where I believe no one can see me. Where I try to play it off, like I’m not even that bothered by it, like I’m just annoyed you didn’t understand what I wanted you to do.
Where I outline my big emotions without dipping into the gritty details, where we can romanticise our flaws and shortcomings. Find me here when I’m finding my words fall short, because they can’t begin to describe the waves that live inside me, building slowly like tsunamis. When everything goes quiet, and I gaze into the horizon bewildered, only to be struck by violent currents that I knew lived just below the surface.
goodbye
"Write a book" she said, "Write a book about what?", I said.
I've always said I wanted to write a book, and so have you - maybe it’s in our DNA. But the most important thing, I think, is that I talk about you and your story, from my point of view, and our point of view, all the things you've done and the things you wanted to do but didn't.
We all have so many stories, and your story became mine, and ours has become yours. The stories that you never wrote, that I've never heard, they might just be lost or live on with someone else. But you are a part of me anyway, and maybe I will write a book and maybe I won’t. It doesn't really matter that much. And you, at some point, were everything to me.
Now you’ve gone on to new adventures. I wish you were always here and I love you and everything you have been. Sleep well, Mom.
return
The trees were heavy and covered in snow, every bit of the landscape resembled a blank sheet of paper as I moved slowly between the shrubs and bushes. I hadn’t visited for a while, but clearly neither had anyone else. The white covered everything, sparkling softly as the sun spread its warm rays throughout the morning hours.
My feet were deep into coldness, and every step became a struggle as I kept on, walking deeper into the forest. As I reached the lake, nothing remained. The small cabin, the fire pit, the shed with our fishing rods were all gone, buried long ago. I could barely make out small shapes of where we’d once lived, and it seemed a lifetime ago all of a sudden. Even the lake was lost, just part of the scenery now, I didn’t know where it started or ended and maybe it didn’t start or end anywhere by now. As I looked around, I noticed something by the edge of the woods. I got closer, and crouched. There were footprints here.
I squinted slightly, staring into the thick vegetation and saw you there, leaning against a trunk.
“Hello?”
The sound of my voice made you jump, and you looked back at me bewildered. It was as if you’d been here all along, and my presence disturbed your train of thought. “How long have you been here?” I said. “Always.” you replied, no expression on your face. It was a pointed needle now, no longer a confession. “It’s good to see you.” I said and walked over to you.
suspicious minds
“There are words I wish I could take back, and secrets I wish I had never told you.”
She stared at me from across the room, searching for anything that could break me down, for any button to be pushed. And I didn’t know why.
All I wanted was to tell her how I felt, that’s all I ever wanted to do. And yet, she was looking for more. For something unknown to me, she wanted to find that something that could make this all go away. I don’t think it mattered anymore whether or not it was true.
Sometimes it would be easy to notice, the way she would grab hold of the wrong part of a sentence, the part that wasn’t meant to be emphasised. We would agree that it had been an error in communication most of the times, and laughed about it on good days. But the bad days kept coming, until there were only bad days left.
We set this bridge on fire from both ends, and maybe that was intentional. At some point, if no one ever crosses a bridge, no one needed it in the first place.
what is love?
Our backs rest quietly on the grass as we stare into the ceiling of stars spread across the universe. My fingertips are damp from the mildew covering the green straws of grass as I gently run my hands across the ground, and I can feel the cool against the back of my shirt meeting the warmth of my skin, balancing out perfectly. Like so many things in this world.
I let out a long sigh and turn my head to face you. There are tiny drops sticking to your hair, and you’re like a frozen piece of art as you stay perfectly still like a statue. Did time actually stop this time? But then your eyes close for a second and maybe the small drops in your hair are fallen tears, I see another one forming in the corner of your eye and slowly making its way down your chin. My hand automatically moves to stop it in its path, but I pause midair to observe the strangeness of gravity. I can’t stop them even if I try.
We’re stuck here together, such a fleeting constant. We come to this secret hideout every night to watch the magic of objects far out of reach, to feel together as we remain alone underneath the weight of the world. We reach down into our pockets to pull our feelings, thoughts and dreams out and pick them apart as if they were clockwork, intricate pieces that work together to tell time at our whim, a constructed concept that we all rely on for all our predictions. Then we piece them back together, so we can still be predictable and relied on once we return back home.
We bring new words and old words with us here, so we can belong and so we can distance ourselves just enough. Just like clockwork, we are forming circles. We’re a mathematical formula, fibonacci in nature, infinitely repeated when magnified.
time
Trains pass by as if they were slow ticks and tocks, keeping time. He sits on an old cracked bench, watching them pass trying to capture the feeling of traveling wind on his face, smell the excitement and jitters from inside the carts, watching busy planning float through the lips of couples squeezing tightly together drawing lines on the maps between them.
He holds the handle of his suitcase tightly, his knuckles turned white from the strain, his fingers aching from determination. The voice of the announcer tells him “train to London departing at 3:15, all on board!” and he looks at his bare wrist.
He gets up and walks toward the narrow door, stopping a few feet away to let a woman with a stroller in first. She looks up at him as she struggles to keep her belongings gathered, her jacket sliding softly from atop her luggage. As he bends over to pick it up, his body sighs under the weight of his thoughts. She smiles apologetically and nods as she reaches for his hand, grabbing the jacket to stuff it into the bag barely resting on her shoulder. He remains in place as she loudly stumbles and huffs further into the train.
He hears the sharp whistle through the crisp air of fall, and the doors creak as they slowly close. The train gently creeps forward and is soon out of view, inside the pitch black tunnels ahead. He lets out the air he’s been holding down inside his lungs, and shuffles back to his seat of wood and iron and dreams.
linger
We sit by the crackling fire we’ve built with our own hands. I’ve found a few extra pieces of wood, and chuck them into the flames trying to keep the fire going but it’s the last bits of wood I could find for tonight. I am scared of what will happen when the fire slowly dies down, but for now we’re still kept warm.
We’ve been out here for a substantial amount of time, trying to survive. I remember the day we arrived, just lost for a short moment running wildly through thick brush and branches. We found sticks that resembled a cat and a dog and a sheep, we built them into a small farmhouse and gathered other sticks and leaves for a roof. You made up stories about where they had lived before you saved them, your eyes glittering enthusiastically in the soft rays of sunlight glimmering through the canopy. You named them carefully by personality and grace, and they grew into a vast collection of belongings that wouldn’t be packed.
We drew pictures in the dirt every Sunday as gifts for each other. They were snapshots of what used to be, our lives and tales of people we still hadn’t met. We’d create games to entertain us into the late hours of night; keeping the shadows cast from our silhouettes at bay.
You made drums from a rusty kettle and found some sticks to make a beat, and I whistled into short pieces of grass, we’d make the awkward sounds resemble love songs we’d imagine from the words we had shared. When the moon came out, we danced to the remainder of the melodies making our way down to the lake for a midnight swim. When the sun rised we would lay in the middle of the clearing, laughing at nothing as you held my hand.
We grew used to our surroundings, we built a small treehouse leaning into the lower branches of a large tree and decorated its interior with all our creations We made crayons from coal to make pieces of art on the walls, and we would find plants to braid into rugs and funny-looking curtains We made these woods into our home.
One morning with particularly heavy rain, you asked me if it was time to leave now. I pretended not to hear, I got up and said I’d take our cups down to the lake to fill them like I did every morning. The rain felt like it would pierce my skin as I walked down the path we’d trampled down so many nights and days, and my hands trembled as I pushed the cups down below the surface. When I got back, you sat on your knees by the wall drawing again and we stayed.
Are you leaving in the morning, I say more than I ask. You look at me in silence like you have so many times before; but this time I can hear you. I pick up a stick and poke at the last fews logs, bits of ashes spiraling up into the starlit skies above me. This place is so beautiful, and so lonely. I try to think of something to say, but I can’t. So I put the stick back down, and sit next to you, my head on your shoulder. I’m leaving tonight, you finally say and get up. The last smouldering pieces of the bonfire about to die out, and I let them.
trails
Warm water runs down my face, my arms, my legs. I try to imagine all my thoughts running down the drain with it, erasing everything I’ve let out over the past few days. I want to undo, I want to regret them, but I can’t.
Do you remember the soft summer wrap around us, its air breathing down our necks as we walked together through the downtown lights and nothing mattered except the night we were in? How easy it would have been to speak freely, but somehow we were muted by our fears and pride. I spoke of the books I read with great passion, and the places I wanted to go making loud plans, I held my head high and pretended to be strong but when I closed the door behind me night after night I’d still end up on the floor of my bedroom, the same silent tears lulling me to sleep. That’s my constant.
Someone should have come to get you, I hear her say and these words grow ever louder as I try to find out how this should have ended. I try to imagine what that would look like, I try to figure out why that never seemed like an option to me. I was stuck in a nightmare, and I didn’t even know it wasn’t supposed to be like that. Not until she said those words out loud, and now all I can do is wonder why she didn’t. Why no one came to get me. Those days came and went, and taught me something I want to unlearn.
I’ve tried to tell you everything I know, but I guess the words come out wrong. Or maybe there are no right words for this, and we both know it. So let’s sit quietly for a few moments and imagine a place where none of this ever happened. Let’s rewind, and pretend like we don’t exist, we can erase all the meaningless nonsense we’ve discussed, and all the meaningful mutters of truth in between, let’s remove the bouts of anger and frustration, while we forget the short moments of sincerity we’ve shared. Then I walk backwards out your door, and down the hallway, the elevator doors open and I step inside, when they close I was never here.
constant
You’re writing a story you don’t want to write. You’re reluctant to even put the pen to paper, yet you’re unable to stop. The words and the thoughts consume you, and there’s no where else to go but these blank pages. In the end, they’re not what matters most. In the end, they’re an outlet for your mixed emotions and you’ll soon forget them.
You’ll forget about the pages, and the feeling you had when you tried to explain. They’ll be a faded memory some day, when you sit on your porch in the sunset, thinking back on your life and the places you went, the choices you made and the memories you have created. It will be a fond memory, kind of like how your house used to smell Sunday morning when your father would be in the kitchen making eggs and bacon and you can still remember how the scent of coffee was intriguing but whenever he offered you some you’d wrinkle your nose and shake your head remembering the bitterness of the last time you tasted it.
You’ll forget it even mattered, how you had this sense of urgency trying to stack your words in the perfect way, so that they would make sense. So that they wouldn’t fall over.
What will matter is the way she looked on your wedding day, not her dress or her hair. Not her makeup or the shoes she chose, but how her face lit up when your hands joined together and you were taking the first leap of many. Maybe you thought it wouldn’t be something you’d remember so clearly, but nothing could compare to that trust. Except for the memory of her paint stained hands as she rolled that last bit of paint onto the walls of the room your first child would hopefully sleep in. How you both discussed what color would be most soothing, or maybe there should be a mural with colorful scenery behind their crib. And you remember how she was so strong when you weren’t, and the sound of a brand new person taking their first few breaths of air and the smell of their skin when you held them night after sleepless night, your eyes struggling to stay open. You will remember how she would kiss every little scratched up knee and bruised elbow, she would sneak into their rooms and stroke their hair in the middle of the night just to have one more minute with them, and she’d crawl back into your bed telling you how grateful she was with teary eyes squeezing your hand as she fell asleep.
You will remember so many things, and you will treasure all of them for what they made you experience, how they made you feel and how they changed you. No single moment defining who you are, but all of these bits and pieces doing their part.
And so here you are, slowly rocking while the last bit of sun warms your skin, that day playing back in your head and you smile wondering what might have been. But you have no regrets. A car pulls up in front of the house and there he is, the love of your life and his small blueprint copies chasing one another out from the backseat and soon crashing into your lap. Grammy! You place each of your hands on top of their heads and ruffle their hair. They kiss your cheek and run inside to see her - she made their favorite for supper and you can see every piece of her in everything you love.
love letters
The words fall out of my mouth like heavy rain in summer, slightly uncomfortable, like an unexpected nuisance but still warm and soft in a way.
When they’re left unrequited I search for probable cause, I want to believe that we’re here in the same boat about to sink, but there’s unforgiving silence instead. I’m left alone with my love notes, trying to figure out what it is I meant. And I don’t know.
If these things made sense, it would be easier to follow my train of thought back to the woods I grew up in, where all I really intended to find was a small hand to hold. One that would always hold mine, and would run with me between old pine trees pretending to be the fox to my squirrel, studying the slight movements of wildlife as we made it our own little secret.
Things were easier then, we never questioned our motives, we were just there hiding under the branches as the other kids passed by, they’d never find us here. We held our breath until they were out of sight and I told you I brought another secret to share. You stared at me with wide eyes while I pulled my bag of chips out from the bushes and you were just as excited as I was to loudly reveal our location.
window
From where I stand, I can see the curve of your neck as you’re hunched over something at your kitchen table, your brows furrowed, concentrating deeply on the task at hand. I am familiar with the stray strands of hair curling at the bottom of your hairline, and I want to reach out and touch them. I watch you from afar for a few minutes, trying to decide.
Then suddenly she appears behind you, you look up and smile briefly. She walks over to you and rests her hand on your shoulder, her lips forming a question. You answer, still looking down, your hands gesticulating in the air and at the end of the sentence you laugh and look back up at her. She smiles, I imagine this is what mundane love looks like.
She turns away from you and picks something up from the floor, starts placing items into the wall. I realize she’s putting away the groceries she has been out buying. I didn’t even notice her driving by, but I’ve tried imagining what she would look like many times and I’m not even remotely close. I should leave, but my feet are heavy and stick to the ground, I don’t know why I want to stay.
When she’s finished, she starts pulling pots and pans out from cabinets and she disappears and reappears in the window sill, words dancing between you and laughter bouncing off the walls. I wanted to unmute and turn the volume up, curious about your conversational topics on this ordinary Wednesday afternoon. Finally she brings you a plate and you put away whatever you’re doing. As the daylight starts fading, I watch you have dinner together in a small lit up square.
Afterwards you stand up and clear the table, disappearing from view. She follows you, and I’m left staring at the empty window. My arm has tiny goosebumps, I hadn’t noticed that it got chilly.
I try to imagine you behind the walls of your house. She lights candles on the shelves, and a record spins on the LP-player, music from an old album you both like filling the room. You sit in the corner of your couch with a blanket over your feet reading a book and she comes over to sit next to you. Her fingers habitually tracing your hand while she reads through her newsfeed. Eventually she lifts your arm and puts her head in your lap. Your fingers play with her hair as you ask if she wants to hear the next chapter. She nods sleepily, and you read about the man with tattoos in his palms, he doesn’t speak but the woman still falls in love with him based entirely on “yes” on his left hand, and “no” on his right.
You yawn and close the book, gently nudging her shoulder to wake her up. She folds your blanket while you put the book back in its place, and then you take her hand and lead her to the bedroom. The light flicks off in my little square and I lean against the tree closing my eyes.
words
He combed through all the boxes that held her words, big ones and small ones flowing like rivers up and down pages and like a river pulling with it anything in its path, downward, downward all the way to nowhere.
He thought they’d be endless, as if there would always be words left to say, even when there weren’t really any words at all. Where one sentence ended, the next started seamlessly and with no limitations. It may have been difficult to see then, that words speak louder than actions, although isn’t it the other way around?
The largest words were saved for last and then followed by an utter silence. That had happened before, long pauses and large voids but with an agreement that there’d always be words yet to come.
Somewhere along the way he gathered all the letters, along with rocks and feathers, a love note from strangers and a handprint, tore them to pieces, crossing words out with a thick black pen. Going through them now, large bits and pieces were missing, a jigsaw puzzle you could never complete. His mind scrambled trying to fill in the blanks, but somehow everything had been erased years ago. Maybe it was for the best. These pieces of memories long lost were witness to more than words ever could be. He never told her how angry he used to be. How much she let him down. How he longed for her to tell him the truth. Did she string him along all those years? Was it all just a game?
By the end of the story he had finally come clean. Revealed all of his shortcomings and how he wanted the story to end. And all he was left with were these torn pages, fragmented promises and a dirty feather that had once seemed meaningful.
weeds
“Images stuck in your head”
The bathroom in this bar is particularly dirty, like the ones you see in a movie. Tissues cluttering the floor and the smell is unbearable but I followed you in here to have a moment alone with you. There’s a strange hollow in the wall where you place your half-full bottle of vodka and by the way you’re swaying I can only assume it was full at the beginning of this night.
But still, when you ask if I want some I accept. You grab it from the sill and help yourself to a sip before handing it to me, standing inappropriately close to someone you don’t know. I can smell your hair and your breath and without realizing it I’m leaning into you. Your cheek slightly touches mine and you laugh a laugh that belongs to you - my heart flutters.
“Drink up, baby, look at the stars”
The stale summer air is stifling as I pick up the cue and aim for the blue ball. Finally you appear, walking down the long stairs to this enormous empty space. I try to act like I haven’t been waiting, like my night wasn’t depending on whether or not you’d show up. Suave.
As we move on to bowling, I grasp every opportunity to brush past you, breathing you in. Your scent, your soft skin, I can’t help but to reach out and slightly touch your hand as I pass you by when my turn is up. It’s like an intricate dance we’ve secretly rehearsed all spring, synchronized and always just out of reach.
I walk you home, and our words are muffled imitations of conversation. I can’t concentrate on anything but placing one foot in front of the other and when we reach your door all to sudden I pull you into a hug that lasts for too long.
“Drink up one more time”
Your face is lit up by an ambulance passing by several floors below us. On your balcony we take a short break from deep conversation, looking out at the city lights. I try to create a snapshot of your face, all the lines and features, the way your lips move as you ask if I want to go back inside. Your smile, your dimples, how your hair falls into your eyes when you look down noticing I’m staring at you.
Sometimes I can still remember how you used to look, but it seems like a dream now. Just as clearly, I can remember standing outside your building with my insides on fire and warm tears running down my face. The way you would change from hot to cold in seconds, leaving me lost and bewildered trying to find my way home.
I take several breaths of air and start walking down the street, determined to not look back. Determined to not let these questions stay on my mind and in my heart. But I fall, and my pants tear at the knee and I have bruises on my hands and I don’t know where I’m going.