#Words and Quotes

[horriblewithwords]

You see, I wasn’t lost in the flame. What might been heard or seen as disastrous from the distance you created wasn’t a cry out of pain. No. That was the pure joy that came with being cast into the flame again.

You gave me the chance to start again. What else did you think would happen? That I would lose myself in the flame? Just disappear? I’m sorry but you must have confused me with someone else.

How else was I supposed to come out? You let me forge myself. Every abuse before, no, yeah, that was when I suffered more. What I did to myself in the flame was clearly just sculpt the figure. This figure of mine before you can endure the flame. These glows that my body embers are just for you to see.

[wordsintheattic]

“Like flowers that bloom in silence, some of the most beautiful things are never spoken aloud.”

— Anish KC, wordsintheattic

[the-rightworld]

l i f e.

[thepastisapebbleinmyshoe]

[creatingnikki]

you told me not to inscribe your name in my journal so early on— a casual warning wrapped in tender precaution like a half-healed scar afraid to be remembered afraid you'd be just another ghost in the margins of my narrative, protecting us both from potential heartbreak

but from the first collision of our breaths your silhouette was already etched—permanent as bone inevitable as gravity pulling two wounded planets into orbit

when you called on my birthday months later, your voice was a trembling wire between us and I wept—not from joy, but from the raw recognition of how little it takes to crack open a heart that's been holding its breath

you said this was the least you could do and I swallowed the bitter laugh of a thousand unsaid reproaches because even in our fracturing, I refuse to become the blade that cuts deeper into your pain

what is love if not a scattered landscape of broken glass and wildflower petals dangerous yet tender where we walk barefoot, bleeding and still call it home

[sentientsky]

You cry for the mother you wish you had. You cry for the mother you have, who doesn’t seem to want you (Lynne Shayko)

Annie Ernaux // Agatha All Along, episode 5 // Arcadia, “Mommy” // Kyung-Sook Shin, Please Look After Mom // Wandavision, episode 8 // Wych Elm, "Susan Smith"

[beppeux]

[haikkun]

Share My Gum

I cry

Like you cum

Spilling down our knuckles

Licked from both our thumbs

And the rivulets’ reflexive

Desire to meld together

Has me wondering less

How you could smell

The spearmint

Across the phone

And more

Why we cannot

Share the suffering

Like we shared

The joy

________________________

Maureen Armstrong @haikkun

[xoceansx]

"She often felt she was nothing but a sponge sopped full of human emotions."

— Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse

[petrichor-moss-and-lightning]

“ever forward, always looking back,” Aurora Picciottoli

[horriblewithwords]

Did you miss me?

[wordsintheattic]

“Every so often, there comes a silence so profound it almost feels alive, breathing and haunting in the voids where words dared not enter.”

— Anish KC, wordsintheattic

[the-rightworld]

l o v e.

[itisnotpoetry]

Love is peace!

[creatingnikki]

I sit there across you in the café that we usually hang out at writing you a letter. You're leaving the city. Yes, that doesn't mean that you are leaving my life. But leaving is still leaving. And so I have to write you a letter, I want to. But life has been chaotic and heavy and I didn't get the time to do this before meeting you now. All I could do was grab my letter writing supplies and stuff them in my bag as I left home tonight to come see you. So once I reach, I ask 15 minutes of you to write the letter in real time. And once I am done putting it in the envelope I realize I don't have a sticker to seal it the way I usually do and you say, 'wait a minute' and reach for your wallet.

You are giggling and I begin to giggle too even though I don't know what it's going to be. But it's always been that way with you. It's light, it's laughter, and it's warmth. Always? Well, a big chunk anyway. I smile and giggle and laugh in anticipation of smiling and giggling and laughing.

You remove a band aid from your wallet and then we giggle some more. I take it. Of course, I do. With you, I'll let myself do such things that make me forget that I am 26. Or that perhaps let me be without having to be something else. I begin to unwrap the band aid and you start recording me. The whole thing becomes a funny little sweet moment and an analogy of this band aid signifying healing between us. After all, we have recently reconnected after months of trying to be strangers.

I say this is all so poetic. I've said it before. I say it all the time. I view my life and life in general through the lens of poetry and literature and books. Everything is a scene from a story. A few minutes later another such moment is shared and before I can say anything you say, 'this is so cinematic'. That's when you make the observation and say, everything you call poetic I call cinematic. And that very observation and the articulation of that observation as we begin to leave the café post midnight is poetic to me.

Poetic or cinematic, whatever we were, whatever we are, I'm glad we crossed paths and attempted healing. This is a goodbye, not the goodbye. From the minute we met, you have been helping me fight my cognitive distortions. Why? Because you are healthy and normal. All I have wanted this year are normal experiences and normal people. Normal does not mean all good and smooth sailing. To me, it only means things not blowing out of proportion or going bat shit crazy. Things not resembling the arc of a book or a movie.

I've been consciously realizing lately how seeing my life and myself from the lens of a story and being the mc is not helpful. It gives my life this fanciful flavour and adds whimsy but with that comes unnecessary plot twists and agony.

"Normal" can also be poetic/cinematic. I don't need to be an unreliable narrator for that or let wild, vicious people in my life. I don't have to take whacky decisions and put up with things for character development. My life can be normal — light, full of laughter, and warmth. Without it having to be blindingly bright, headache-inducing laughter, and scorching warmth.

Thank you. Thank you for helping me come to that realization. I'm glad you exist.