Tuesday 26 December 2017

To Joel,

Dear Joel,
I've been taking French classes (Paris, the ever-cheesy dream), and I've come across a word. éphémère. It's been two months since I've seen this word and it refuses to leave me. It means something that lasts for a short while, and it's more or less the same word in English. Ephemeral; which really annoys me, because if we have a word like this, so enchanting, why do we insist on using a mundane word such as temporary? And it got me thinking that this might be the whole reason why people are so scared of things being temporary; it's the charm of the words. I know I sound a little bit like a lunatic, but bear with me. If you want to confirm my theory, weigh out forever and all its synonyms with this word, temporary. Eternal, everlasting, endless, hell even the word always outweighs it. Joel, ever-since I heard the word éphémère and I've had a certain infatuation with temporariness. Now everything fleeting induces this certain softness, lightness even in my heart. I think I just had an epiphany. Maybe, the reason why I feel such sudden lightness and softness towards this word, and the meaning it brings is because it's so close to my favourite word. Effleurer (which means to touch lightly). I am allowing everything to touch me lightly and go, Joel. And it only took me two French words, and a love that's calm.

Yours always,

Sunday 29 October 2017

Onism

Onism  n. "The frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time, which is like standing in front of the departures screen at an airport, flickering over with strange place names like other people’s passwords, each representing one more thing you’ll never get to see before you die—and all because, as the arrow on the map helpfully points out you are here"  (In short, being aware of how little of the world you get to experience)

Imagine, a word, made up of only five letters, is the reason my chest feels like it's being pulled down by a 12-floor building.
A word, made up of only five letters, is the reason my eyes can't find it in them to give in to sleep.
And speaking of sleep, did you know that the average person will sleep 229,961 hours in their lifetime or basically one third of their life? Did you also know that this simple fact managed to keep me up at night for the entirety of  the past week?
Because if I sleep one third of my life, when do I get to live my life?
I read 10 books in parallel, not because I am indecisive, but because I want more than this world allows me.
I always experience things half and half, because I am here, but I am thinking of everything that could have been if I weren't.
I've always hated my limitedness. I want to burn each and every map that says I am here to the ground.
I've always hated having just one, really short lifetime.
The possibilities of everything I could ever be narrowed down to one life time.
The idea of all the lives I will not live, all the universes I will not get to see, all the conversations I will never get to have, all the music I won't get to hear.
In the end, I am only one human among 7 billion humans, on a planet that has 195 countries. One human, on a planet that has a billion worlds within.
Do I dare mention the idea of the existence of other planets, other universes? I think not.
It makes my bones ache and my mind strain.
I am terrified of the idea of not living, the idea that I can only be one thing, or a limited number of things.
I am being burdened with the weight of something that's not there. All the forsaken possibilities.
It's both agonizingly beautiful and beautifully agonizing to be human.
The agony of not knowing, the agony of having no control over anything, of having no control over being here to begin with. The beauty, the beauty of loving and being loved and getting hurt and all the in betweens.
It's all too much and it's still not enough.

Tuesday 12 September 2017

To Tom (1)

Dear Tom,
Last time I wrote to you, I did so with an unbearable heaviness on my heart, a heaviness that kept pressing its weight further and further down my throat, claiming my body, inch by inch; my lungs, my heart, my legs, and those hands with which I am writing to you this letter at the moment, the hands that always helped me let go of my weight, that helped me scream metaphors at the sky when my mouth was choking on thorned letters; they, too, have fallen victim to the heaviness. It feels like forever, Tom, forever since I held a pen and didn't ache with every word that goes out of it. I have an urge to disintegrate my body, piece by piece, to understand. But I never can. So let me just tell you about the piece that has shown itself to me tonight. My longing. I long so much for the times I was lighter, for times when my heart found solace in the sky, or when the lyrics to my favourite songs used to make sense. Do you remember how much I cried when we heard Sleeping At Last's Saturn? You thought I was going mad; later on I told you how the line that went "How rare and beautiful it is to even exist" made me feel like someone held my heart between their hands and caressed it, how it sent fireworks roaming up and down my spine. You still thought I was mad, but you kissed me anyway. Now even as I write those words to you, it feels like I've already written them a thousand times. The light is leaving me, Tom. I am still trying not to use the past tense; how does one deal with the loss of the only thing that kept them hanging? I barely recognize myself these days; blank eyes, lifeless smile, empty words. All I want to do is detach from everything, and everyone. I am slipping away from my surroundings bit by bit, and it's not scaring me, it's comforting, but the loneliness isn't. Am I making any sense to you? Ironic, isn't it? A writer who can't describe how they feel. I'll stop here before you go mad. I miss you, I still remember the last time we met. The sun always seemed to follow you everywhere, hold on to your light, Tom.
Yours always.

Wednesday 21 June 2017

To Leo

Dearest,
I don't know exactly why I am writing you this, I am not sure exactly what I want to tell you. I just know that you're the only one who might understand the unfathomable, even to myself. I know you know what's coming next, it's the same old same old, really. I am so tried, Leo. It's like sadness lures me in, you know me better than most I am not romanticizing, but I don't know how else to put it. Sometimes I feel like there's something rotten inside me and it's the reason for my state, it's the reason for my constant despair and anxiety. I always have this feeling that something is chasing me, that something is going to get me for good. Sometimes I just wait for it to, you know. There is so much I can't say out loud, there are many things I am ashamed of, Leo. I mostly feel like I am looking at myself through a glass door; the observer is so much repulsed by the observed, sometimes I pity me, too. I am looking for answers in Bob Dylan songs, and I know he doesn't offer them, I am just desperate. I turn from song to song, from book to book, looking for a page or a line that would give me some sense of familiarity, anything that tells me that I am not so alone, anything that wards off this alienation. In a sense I know I am not _alone_, but it doesn't help that much, you know? Am I making sense? I keep going further and further into myself I don't know what is what anymore, Leo. This is the most I've talked to anyone since forever, but again, you know me better than most, this might be a quarter of the story. I love you, darling.
Yours forever,

Wednesday 8 March 2017

I dare not call it depression



When I can't breathe because there is something so heavy pressing on my chest that it aches and screams, when something is clawing at my throat, blocking the air, blocking the words. I dare not call it depression.

I call it a dark pit that I fell into, a dark pit I can't seem to get out of, but I dare not call it depression.

When I cannot make it out of bed because I just can't face the world anymore, I dare not call it depression.
When smoking is the only self harm I am brave enough to do, when imagining my lungs burning with every drag I take feels satisfying, I dare not call it depression.

When everything that used to make me feel happy and limitless makes me feel blank, like a car ride, or a night walk, or looking at the sky. In fact, I don't even look at the sky anymore. I still dare not call it depression.

When the light in my eyes is dimmed, when the light goes out altogether. I still dare not call it depression.

When I fail to bring back any healthy habit I once had because what's the point anyway? I dare not call it depression.

When I break down 3 times in a row because I just can't take it anymore, I can't take being here, I can't take staying. I dare not call it depression.

When I can't stop thinking about the peaceful silence that will follow my last heartbeat, my last breath, I dare not call it depression.

I dare not call it depression, because I know that somewhere someone is having it worse and they dare not call it depression, so how dare I?

I dare not call it depression because I felt okay for 2 hours that day.

I dare not call it depression because I am scared.
I dare not call it depression because I am fucking scared.

Sunday 5 February 2017

Reminders. (29-1-2017)


1-You don't have to struggle in silence. And when you decide not to. you don't have to go for the stranger. You don't have to fear being a burden, or a dead weight. Your friend will hold your hand and tell you you'll be okay. And you will be.
2- Growth is tough. It doesn't come with flowers behind it's back. It comes with ache, it comes with mourning. But just like a flower grows out of the dirt, you grow out of the darkness. You become more graceful with each heartache.
3- You're significant, no matter how big of a place the world feels for you, no matter how tiny, or how unobserved you think you are. Your worth doesn't lie in your achievements. Your worth lies in your big heart and your kind eyes. You worth lies in how much you keep trying even though it gets so heavy sometimes.
4- Your feelings are valid. If you sway between happy and sad three times a week, it's still valid. If you sway between happy and sad two times a day, it's still valid.
5- Vulnerability does not equal weakness, it doesn't equal fragile. Vulnerability is human. It's okay to wear your heart on your sleeve. It's okay to scream. It's okay to cry
6- You're not alone, and even though alone sometimes feels like the only thing you can ever be, it's not. And even if it closes down on you to the point of suffocation sometimes. Remember that somewhere, someone is reaching their hands out for you, someone is willing to talk you through your stormy nights, someone is willing to sit there and just listen to you while you lay your heart out. Just remember." 

7/1/2017

"Two writers fall in love with each other
Two writers fall in love with each other and a big bang happens.
Two writers fall in love with each other and next thing you know, there is a novel about how knees accidentally brushing under the table is just like volcanoes erupting.
Two writers fall in love with each other, and their finger entwining make prose, and books are written based on the silent glances that pass between them.
Two writers fall in love, and their heartbeats are immortalized in words more breathtaking than any music, they write about each others' eyes and all of a sudden sunsets can't even compare.
Two writers fall in love, he makes her a goddess among mortals, she writes to him like he's an alter and her words are a prayer.
Two writers fall in love, and they breathe poetry into each others' mouth when they kiss, making love is writing sonnets on each others' skin.
Two writers fall in love with each other and they're each others' muse, their fingertips drip poetry like there's no escape from their overflowing words.
Two writers fall out of love with each other.
Two writers fall out of love with each other and the world crumbles down.
Two writers fall out of love, and you know words leave worse bruises than fists.
Two writers fall out of love, and the words are spit out of their mouths like poison, like sharpened daggers, except that they hurt more.
They say that when a writer falls in love with you you can never die,
but two writers fall out of love with each other, and no one comes out alive."

28/12/2016

Unsolicited advice to lonely people with demons on their backs and voices in their heads. (After Jeanann Verlee)
When someone asks you why you're so quiet, smile. 
When your friend asks why you've been pushing her away, tell her that you're not. 
When you find yourself on the edge of collapsing at 3 am; do not tell anyone, you don't want to seem desperate. 
When you find yourself on the edge of collapsing at 3 am and you really need someone; don't talk to the same person twice, because again. you don't want to seem desperate.

When someone asks you why you're so quiet, smile.
When you're in a place and you start feeling like you're background noise, leave.
When your chest aches because it's crashing under the weight of your demons, call for help, scream, cry, paint the walls black. 
When the voices in your head come from every corner, shrill and unforgiving, scream louder. 



When someone asks you why you're so quiet, smile.
When your friend asks you why you've been pushing her away, tell her that you're sorry,  tell her that you've been busy keeping the monsters at bay. 
When you find yourself on the edge of collapsing at 3 am, run for the phone, do not run for the blade, or the window, or the pills.
When you find yourself on the edge of collapsing at 3 am and you really need someone, call someone. Tell them you need them. It's okay to be desperate. 


When someone asks you why you're so quiet, smile. They do not know about the demons. 

7/12/2016

I used to think that heartbreak only came in the shape of a boyfriend breaking up with you,  but I learned the hard way that heartbreak knocks your door dressed up in all shapes. I learned the hard way that friend break your heart, too.  My heart broke when I overheard two people saying that homosexuals should be killed. My heart broke when my friend came crying her heart out to me about how much she's scared of going to hell, about how much she fears God, about how much she thinks of putting the razor to her skin but the only thing stopping her is the thought of hell., not hope, not the dream of things getting better, not love, hell. My heart breaks every time someone speaks about something that makes them feel alive with a low voice out of fear of being mocked. My heart breaks everyday because cruelness is considered the norm.  My heart breaks when kindness is enfolded in apologies for being "cheesy". My heart breaks and breaks at how we became fluent in the language of war and hate, at how the word peace rolls on our tongues like an empty promise. My heart breaks  I  also learned that heartbreaks aren't always terrible when I felt that ache in my chest while watching a sunset, I felt like my heart was breaking itself on purpose so maybe this time at least it could be broken for something beautiful and raw.

14-5-2014

I’m scared. Scared of forgetting you, of being left with only the fading memory of your importance without knowing why..
All the material things I know how to keep - a paper you once wrote, a picture, a drawing, those are kept safe and sound, I’m not worried about them. The metaphysical ones are the once I’m scared for. The many specific moments you and I used to share - your fingers touching the tips of mine, your sleepy voice on the phone, your hand entwined in my hand, and the day before you left for good. Those are slipping away from me, like water slipping through my fingers. And the more I try to hold on to them, the faster they run away. 
I am scared, scared because I’m only left with fading memories and my feeble attempt to have something of you to hold on to.
I may forget all the memories, but I don’t think I can ever forget you, you’re engraved in my brain. I miss you.