Book 2

I'm sorry. I'm truly sorry that I held on for so long. I see now that it was a mistake. I see now that I shouldn't have done so. But you must understand. I only held on because I hoped that if I kept the book alive, if I kept writing, I could turn the ending around. I didn't want to accept that my first book has a sad ending.

But now I see that it's ok if it ends badly. It's ok if the last pages are smudged. Because it's a good book. It was wonderful and terrible all at once, but it was never boring. I jumped so frequently between up and down that neither could ever claim me as their own.

I learned a lot. Living all those pages taught me more than I could have ever hoped to learn. I'm a better person today because of that bad ending. I lived. Those pages I've been clinging to are the proof that I lived, in all the deep meanings of the word. So what does it matter if it ended on a bad note? The beginning and middle were worth the read. Holding on and trying to scribble down nonsense just to keep a dead story alive won't change how it ended.

So here's my birthday present to myself. I will finally stop writing. I will stamp the words "The End" at the place where twenty-three years of life end, and I will add "Book 1" to the title page. I will close the book and set it aside. I will grant it freedom. I will let it be the way it was meant to be. Sad ending and all.

For my birthday, I give myself the truth and a beginning. I give myself a fresh start. A new book, with new dreams, new hopes and new aspirations. I give myself endless free space for change to find rest. I give myself empty pages and new pens. I give myself a Book 2.

Happy Birthday, even if it's two days late..

To Me

Hopeless Optimism

My eyes were closed. They've been so for quite some time now. Not closed by lids, nor by choice. My eyes were screwed shut by layer upon layer of scar tissue. My eyes were held in darkness, bound by fear and forces of pure negatives. My eyes haven't seen the light of day in ages. It has been so long I forgot that anything existed beyond the screen of pain filled shadowy webs covering my vision.

Today I will coax myself awake. I will search within my pulsing darkness until I find myself. I will call to that abused creature hiding in a corner of my mind. I will speak until my cords go numb, I will shout a cacophony of bright images into the lack. I will sing the melody of my very being until the air fills with a million parts of myself and the vibrating energy of my particles calls my soul back to life. I will merge with that shackled essence of who I am and I will embrace every part of myself.

I will rise once more. I will stand on my so called broken legs and I will smile through my scars. I will drag in a lungful of air and I will feel it fill my chest with electrical life. I will cleanse the inside of my flesh. I will scour every inch of bone, blood and soul until I find every last drop of that damn ocean of poisonous pessimism and I will cough it all back out. I will clean myself of those clingy pieces of darkness. I will banish them into oblivion with the force of the magical power that is my mind.

I will shed my skin. I will unzip that outer layer of ugly scars, burns, bruises and a million other signs of being trampled and I will let the overused skin fall to the ground. I will stand among my ashes and I will shine with a bright new suit of skin. My lessons are beautiful, my hurts, my downfalls, my scars are all too good to be painted in such gruesome names. My life is a story etched into my flesh, it is written in the DNA making up my cells. And it is beautiful. It is not a layer of slashed skin. It is a bright piece of human armor beaten to perfection. The coiled bits of skin I'm standing on are what the darkness made my life seem. But the tough, unique strength of my new outside is what my life looks like in the light of hope.

I will unclench my hands and I will let go of those shackles and chains that were holding me down. I will let the sound of them hitting the ground become the music of my victory. I will let the sudden lightness of my weight lift me against the pull of gravity. I will break free of even the basic laws of the universe. I will stand tall with my newly unveiled eyes shining with peace. I will stand among the pieces of illusion I clung to as the darkness engulfed me. And I will let the light of my hopeless optimism paint all of that pain into beautiful perfection. 

I Watched as You Died

The sun has set. It traveled, slow and steady, down the sky as I sat there watching. I watched as it descended. I watched as it dimmed. I watched as the world changed colors. I watched as the day shed its skin. I watched as the end of the brightness came. I watched as darkness won. I watched as darkness won. I watched as you died. 

The color drained from your face. Your heartbeat moved and changed, slower and slower as I sat there watching. I watched as your life line took a dip. I watched as your body fought to live. I watched as your body lost the fight. I watched as your body convulsed. I watched as you realized the end was near. I watched as you took your last breath. I watched as you took your last breath. I watched as you died. 

My sun had set. My sky bled into utter darkness, sudden and morose, it overwhelmed my entire existence as I sat there watching. I watched your lifeless eyes as I tried to revive you. I watched all our memories change form and dress in gloom as I pushed your heart and pumped your blood. I watched everything break and fall apart as I screamed my air into your dead lungs. I watched as I took my last true breath. I watched as I took my last true breath. I watched as you died. 

The Tale of the Awkward Girl

I knocked the door, my mind all lost. Come in, a voice said and I pushed the door open and in I walked, holding my plate for dear, dear life.

They all smiled in welcome, and I felt my mind slowly contract. It hissed at the strangers, and shied into the furthest corners of my skull.

My smile stayed in place as I handed them the plate. I began my slow retreat, but then came the words that threw my poker face to my feet.

Come in, stay, sit with us -they all said. My hiding brain panicked, and shut down all at once. My smile became forced, and my eyes filled with fright.

I tried to find the words to say no, but my brain was gone and I found no words. I mumbled some letters, but stopped at the shocking sight of my hand on my stomach.

I yelled at my brain to come back, I pleaded for small talk or a question perhaps. My panic grew as they all stared, they asked where I'm from and my answer was barely heard.

Then it came, my brain sent a burst down to my lips and I found myself asking the lamest of all questions. They answered in good humor, and I backed towards the door.

My heart was pounding, my breathing was odd. I shuffled my feet, mumbling and muttering my retreat. Out the door I went, and nearly ran to my room.

I hid behind my locked door, and laughed at myself. I'd forgotten how asocial I could get, and how awkward I can act. I laughed in good nature, not embarrassed at all.

In the end I had done a good deed, I'd given them a plate and a story to tell. They could all share the tale of the awkward girl, standing at their door with her arm around herself. 

Edgeless Lack

She tried to fill her mind with sheets of positives. She tried to spoon feed the space within her skull large bites of all things hopeful. She tried to push words of wisdom and faith into her brain with sheer force of dying will. But try as she might, all her mind would carry was a vast and echoing emptiness that refused to be filled.

She grabbed papers lined with negatives in her desperation, and tried to fill her mind with those instead. She tried to spoon feed the space within her skull small bites of anything she could find. She tried to push words of any kind into her brain with sheer force of dead will. But try as she might, all her mind would carry was a dark and silent lack that refused to be filled.

She searched and searched inside the dark. She felt around the edgeless lack, and tried to listen beyond the quiet. But all she found was more absence, more lack and more space. All she found within herself was a mind gone blank in protest, and a brain gone empty in strike. After all her efforts were worn and spent, she gave in and finally stopped. She sat among all the black waiting for things she knew not about. 

Am I?

Am I self involved? Am I so wrapped up within heavy layers of myself that I've lost sight of everything that doesn't revolve around me? Am I selfish? Do I speak more than I listen? Am I different? Have I changed? Am I becoming everything that I hate?

Do I focus more on me than I do on others? Have I lost all those traits that I've always loved about myself? Am I becoming a narcissistic drama queen? I though my water was drowning me, but is that an illusion? Am I the one drowning others in my waves?

Do I constantly complain? Am I a pain to have around? Am I as annoying to others as I am to myself? Do I chip away at people's patience? Do I dampen every joy? Do I darken every light? Do I steal every center?

Am I losing my patience? Am I letting my own feelings cloud my eyes until they become the center of my sight? Am I right to give myself all my attention? Am I wrong? Did I choose this? Can I change it?

.. I guess what I'm asking is am I different? Do I even like who I've become?

Burning Echoes

I have questions. I keep pushing them away and willing them to hide in rooms too small to hold them, and I try to keep them locked behind bars of mist. But the bindings are too weak to hold weak, and so my questions keep escaping, and they play that game they like that I hate. They repeat themselves like echoes bouncing against the insides of my head, they spread their wordy lines into every space inside of me and they are so demanding that they weaken the structure of every cell they come by.

My questions run so deep they have become a part of who I've become. The longer they stay unanswered the stronger they bruise my moldings. But try as I might I can't find their answers. As good as I am with words, as good as I am at looking, seeing and understanding I can't for the life of me find so much as half an answer. I have looked inside of me and I have looked out and around, but I can't find even the tiniest solid clue that might guide me to where my answers might lie.

I have questions that are burning a hole through my character. They burn so hot and strong it's hard for me to be fine. My strength is wavering and shaking beyond belief, it is cracking under the pressure of so much fire and all I can do is watch helplessly as an echo of flame blackens part after part of who I am. Even the hope that I used to use to lull the questions into sleep has run out. I have no more ideas, weapons or solutions. All I have is eyes that fill with endless tears more times a day than I can count. All I have are long sleepless nights holding my chest as tight as I can against the onslaught of echoes.

My questions are consuming me. They don't understand that there are some answers that can't be found until the time is right. They don't understand that we need to be patient. They don't understand that no matter what they do, no matter what games they play, no matter how many tears they make me shed, no matter how strongly they burn and hurt me they won't find their answers. They don't understand that the reason I haven't been giving them what they want is because right at this moment, what they want doesn't even exist yet.

.. I have questions. And they keep blistering their echoes inside of me. They are stubborn and silly. They belong to that part of me that has been so hurt it regressed into a little child. I have questions that don't care how much they hurt -they keep on screaming why, how and when with every "Lub" of my heart, and they send some of their fire out in tears that run out with every blink of my eyes. 

My Home

Have you ever had a friend that feels like home? If you have one, then you know what I mean. But if you don't, then it might sound odd and make little sense to you. I have one such friend, and my God, I'm a lucky person to call her my home. Let me attempt to explain how it feels, but excuse me if the words come across dry and less laden with feeling than usual. Some feelings run so deep, are so a part of your very DNA that it's nearly impossible to put them to words. They cannot be quantified, described or expressed. Some things are just felt, and they just are.

It's not about love. Love isn't the main ingredient, although it is an important limb. It's about comfort. It's about fitting so perfectly together that all the edges disappear. It's about being so in tune that you can never distinguish which melody belongs to who. Some friendships transcend and become blood. They become like your very skin, something that holds all of you together and yet is still as much a part of you as your mind and heart. 

When you have such a friend, then that friend feels like your home. When your atoms are shaking and uncontrollable, when they are scattered and floating around what is supposed to be your core -being with your homey friend makes all those atoms sit still and finally rest. You feel at peace. You feel right when you've been wrong for a long time. It's like coming back to your house after a long day, putting on your most comfortable clothes and lying down. When that's how it feels to simply be with a friend, then you've found a home in a person, you've found the missing half of your soul, and you are luckier than I can ever say. 

My words were choppy and broken. My sentences were not well strung. My descriptions were clumsy. My writing was not what it always is, but that's the best way I have of describing how this friendship feels. It's so past reality, past words and solids that it can never be captured. But she knows, and I know, and we can feel it. My writing isn't the way it always is, and that's the perfect way for this piece. It is something different, and it just is. 

For my B, my home.. 

I See Stars

Everywhere I look I see stars. They shine bright when I blink and they fade to a low glow when I stare. Wherever I look I find them looking back with knowing light that twinkles with secret things. They are glued to the backs of my lids and they are fixed to my eyes. I find them fallen all around, and I find them soaring high above.

I see stars that tell stories of myself. They hang around waiting for questions that never come. They haunt my sight screaming silent words into the void that is my within. I see them when I sleep and I see them when I wake. I see them when I look and I see them when I try to shield my gaze. They are there dancing within my mind, shaking with words that need an escape. 

I see stars that speak of long dead wishes, of bleeding dreams and broken visions. I see stars that are a mere reflection of light coming off the death of a strong burning flame. I see stars that are nothing but leftover illusions that constantly remind of the dying souls it left behind. I see stars that scream of disappointment and embed the knowledge of fading brightness within every light. 

I know what they would speak and yet they keep haunting my sight. Everywhere I look I see stars. They shine when I blink and they shine when I stare. Everywhere I look I find them looking back with knowing light trying to tell me secret things. They are glued to the backs of my lids waiting for questions that never come. They are fixed to my eyes shaking with stories that need an escape. 

I see stars everywhere I look, and when I finally listen to all their words they tell me secret things that I never knew. I see stars that tell stories of life after what they thought was their death. I see stars that burn brighter than the flame that died to give them life. I see stars that remind that long dead wishes, bleeding dreams and broken visions are nothing but a prelude to brighter lights that bring fire to worlds and skies. I see stars that linger everywhere I look to tell me that the end is the beginning, and the death of fire doesn't mean the light is gone. 

Layers of Person

Don't sit there and tell me that you're a failure. Don't speak those words, don't utter them in my presence or without. Don't ever think them or let them sully your mind and heart, not for a single second, not for half a moment, not for a heartbeat.

Don't look at a graveyard of half finished dreams and use them to judge your worth. Don't look at the ocean of bricks and stones surrounding you and believe the lies they try to tell you. Bricks are what remains of broken buildings but they are also the bits you use to build. If you're surrounded with stone and cement it doesn't mean you're standing in ruins, you could simply be where things have yet to be built.

Stop looking at the materialistic. Stop judging things with a focused mind that only sees what crops it's reaped. Look beyond the field to the lives that you built. Look at me. Look at us, and see the layers of person that you created within us. You might not have given us things from without but by God you gave us pieces that we used to create our within.

You built people. You built us cell for cell, one piece of character at a time and you made us to be worth more than any materialistic things you could have given us. You gave us resilience, you gave us strength of mind and character, you gave us boundless hope and endless ambition, you gave us curiosity, you gave us a love for knowledge that can never be quenched. You gave us us. You made us into the types of human beings that will never fail because they will never stop.

Circumstances can attack at any given moment and take away blocks of what you've gathered in your life, it can take away your gifts and the future you wanted us to have. But you gave us things no one can take from us, not even life itself. You gave us layers of person that we can use to stay upright whenever disaster strikes.

You're not a failure. You raised human beings that stand even as they are falling. You didn't build us lives, you built us into people that will one day build hundreds of lives. You're the biggest success I know, and the best builder and giver the world has ever seen. You might not know it yet, you might not see it, but I swear to you with everything that you built inside of us, we will show you. We will show you how wrong you are.

To the greatest man I know

True Words

Let's speak of the world. Let's speak of water and wind. Let's speak of sun and sand. Let's speak of nature, of God's creations, of beauty.. of anything.

Let's find distractions -things to pin our words to so they don't fall where they always do. Let's cover reality with a thick blanket of nonsense and play a game of hide and never seek. Let's use fake words and look through lying eyes and peer into pretend.

Let's not. Let's instead speak of feelings as they come, and let our words describe what they may. Let's speak of a loss so true and pure that you get lost within it. Let's speak of layers and layers of the same exact feeling spreading shades of the same flavor every moment they exist. Let's speak of that chest tightening lack that robs your heart of anything that isn't confusion.

Let's speak of feeling like you're floating in midair, in utter darkness, without knowing why for neither the present nor the future. Let's speak of the exhaustion of maintaining a semblance of normalcy when your insides are anything but. Let's speak of an endless stream of shadows made of pain and fear and loss that are held in place by nonexistent strands of strength.

Let's speak of an ocean of darkness held at bay by the dim flickers of a dying candle. Let's speak of living in fear of cracking under the immense pressure and falling victim to a world of feelings that constantly searches for a dent in your armor so it can engulf you.

Let's speak of a single limp human soul standing on water, drowning in shadows and carrying the weight of a stormy sky. Let's speak of imagination that speaks real better than reality and of unreal images painting nothing but the truest truth. Let's speak true words in their lying form and let's hope storms, shadows and loss find a way to drain out through them and leave a sliver of emptiness for serenity to find rest. 

Change

I want to take a step back. Or twenty, or perhaps more. I want to take however many steps back it needs for me to see myself and my life clearly. I want to see every messy corner, every broken piece of glass and every pile of ash. I want to see the good and the bad with a clarity that only distance can give.

When I can see everything, when I've developed sight and a mind that can fathom every facet of myself, I want to sit back and make decisions. I want to uproot everything and move it around. I want to reorganize my life, throw things out and put new things in their place. I want change. I want it so badly it is a need and no longer a mere desire.

I need to throw all olds out and bring in a big bunch of new. I want new hopes and new dreams, I want new goals and new plans, I want new ideas and new thoughts. I want a new mind, and a new perspective. I want to want different things and I want to want them differently. I want my surroundings to reflect that need for different -I want everything to be fresh and new.

I want change. I want to go through myself and my life like a tsunami and wash my insides and outsides clean and bare. I want to replant, I want to begin from zero again with nothing but a book of experience guiding me through. I want to change everything through and through, and then sit from afar and bask in the comfort of losing that restlessness that was my old. 

Loss, Faith & Surrender

I don't have any more fancy words in me. I don't have any descriptions, or elegant sentences that tell of how I feel in the most convoluted way I can manage. I have nothing in me but true, honest to god words in their simplest form -words that tell.

I feel lost. The only solid in my life right now is my faith. It is the only tangible protection I have against the madness that is surrounding me, and the only thing keeping me sane and whole. With faith you hold on to Allah, you hold on to him with everything you have and believe in his wisdom, and that your patience will be rewarded. With faith you surrender all thought to Allah, and await those trustworthy actions that make worrying pointless.

I have surrendered. But there are things that must be done on my end. There are fights to be fought, decisions to be made and paths to be taken. There are trials that test my faith and my patience. Life keeps happening to you even if you've surrendered it to Allah. And I don't know how to live it. That is my problem. That is my confusion and my loss.

If it were up to me, I would hide in the littlest corner I could find. I would hide in it with my praying clothes and with my Qura'an and I would spend every minute of my time praying and praying. If it were up to me I would not live, I would just worship, pray and believe. But it is not up to me. It seldom is.

Answers are needed from me. Decisions are expected. Strength is welcomed. Togetherness is required. And they are all things that I am currently running just a little low on. I don't have the wit to find the answers. I don't have the courage to make decisions. I have strength but it is the inward kind that keeps me from breaking, not the outward kind that can hold others' hands. And I have togetherness but it comes in the form of endless praying.

The questions are chipping away at my patience. Questions all around, all the time, from everyone and everywhere. The one person that should have the most questions is me, and I keep those hidden and locked away in a vault labeled "none of my business". I can't answer any questions because I don't have the answers, and I don't want to have them, I don't want to seek them out and I don't want to find them. They are none of my business. They're Allah's, and His alone. That is what surrender means. That is what my faith is.

Alas, I must find answers to give. There are only so many questions you can leave unanswered without tipping people over the edge. My edge might be some distance away, but I have established long ago that I am less than human and my edges seem to always be misplaced. People mistake trust and faith for denial and retreat. But perhaps they are mistaken for each other because they truly look alike.

They need answers, Allah has them but I do not. And so I must once again hunt around inside myself and find some extra patience and strength. Perhaps there is some left on that furthest shelf, or in that corner labeled rainy day. Wherever they are they must be there somewhere, for I need them to brew a potion of answers out of dust. I need them to keep my smile, and to offer up things that I've never had. I need them so I can be for others what my faith is to me -the rope they hold on to when they fall off the edge. 

Tell Me Lies

Hide me away. Tuck me in a safe little corner where the monsters can't find me. Tell me that if I close my eyes then I am invisible, and not a thing can harm me. Hold me in your arms and promise me that the shadows won't consume me. Make me laugh and smile and assure me that as long as I do the tears and pain won't find a way towards me. Feed me a mountain of lies and let it hide reality from my sight. Let the feeble lies shine so bright they blind me from everything that is true.

Look into my eyes and see how bare and broken my soul is. I promise I will try with everything that is left in me to let you see what it truly looks like. Strip away my outsides, pull away the shell, the little pieces of hard metal and unyielding rock. Scrape them off the skin they are stuck to, and peel off the masks that became a part of the bones. Get those hundreds of layers out of the way and tend to the creature that I am underneath. Rock me gently to sleep and promise me that as long as I keep the shields away the nightmares won't come near me.

Tell me everything will be alright. Say it over and over again. Yell it at me as loud as you can until your voice drowns out the endless noise that surrounds me. I promise to try to let you say it, I promise to try to believe you when you shout. Comfort me as you would a child. Tell me empty words that won't make a difference, and make me promises that you can't keep. Hold me as I cry and don't try to make me stop. Tell me that you will never leave. Promise me to be my constant in an ocean that is anything but. Tell me to break down, and promise me that you will hold all my pieces and keep them whole and safe for me.

Make me a child that can hide and believe the troubles won't find them. Reverse the clock and undo my adulthood. Take that horrid thing called being a grown up away from me, and throw it far enough that I can never find it. Do the impossible. Hide me from my responsibility. Tuck me in a safe little corner where I no longer have to fight. Tell me that if I close my eyes then I am invisible, and invisible people are allowed to give up. Hold me in your arms and promise to keep me safe from everything,  most importantly myself. 

They Never Tell You

They never tell you the full truth. They never tell you that your life will never be whole again. They never tell you all the things you need to know, and they never tell you all the things that by all rights must be known.

They tell you you'll be homesick. They tell you it's going to be a difficult adjustment. They assure you that eventually you'll be fine. They tell you time flies, and eventually you'll come back home. They tell you a lot of things, but they never tell you the bits that matter.

They don't tell you that you build a life for yourself. They never tell you that the homesickness goes away because eventually it feels like home. They forget to mention that you find yourself friends that become your family. They fail to tell you that you get attached.

They don't tell you that it feels like that very first goodbye, that first time you left home, when the journey ends and you must go back. They don't tell you how much more it hurts because it's permanent. They don't tell you how painful it is to say goodbye to a place that became your home.

They don't tell you that you'll be filled with a sadness that doesn't ease when you should be happy. They don't tell you that you'll shed tears when you pack. They don't tell you that you will break down what you built brick for brick, and you will end up missing something that is a mere memory for as long as you live.

They don't tell you the truth of it. They don't tell you that it starts with being homesick and ends with it as well. They don't tell you that your life becomes nothing but a series of goodbyes and hellos, and that you'll spend the rest of your life missing someone, something, or somewhere. 

Choking

I'm choking on contradictions. A hundred opposites coursing through me and fighting their way to the surface. Happiness and sadness. Excitement and dread. Hope and fear. Faith and loss. I feel them all. I smile as I sob and I find myself crying when I laugh. I skip around in joy, and then all of a sudden I shrink back into myself and drown in despair.

I feel too many things to feel anything but a lack of air. The tangle of emotions inside me is too loud to be ignored and too messy to be faced. I try to figure them out and to feel them all, but the more attention I give them the stronger they grow. The more I ignore them the more tangled they become. Any way I handle them they grow heavier on my chest, heavier in my throat and behind my lids.

I'm suffocating. My strength is battling my weakness, trying to dislodge the mountain of rocks that is keeping me from breathing but it won't budge. A hundred contradictions is one too many and I'm just lost in the storm they've all wrought up, running around blindly looking for air. I'm tired of it all and yet I am so energized. I want to despair and yet I am filled with boundless hope. I wish to cry but every tear comes with a laugh and the balance carries no relief. I want to scream but the only sound I carry is a whisper that's lost before it ever finds its way out.

I'm being torn to pieces by my contradictions. I'm choking on their fights, and I'm losing my battles because of them. All I know to do is to ride them out. All I can do is choke and choke and choke until they somehow all balance out. 

In The End

I wrapped my body around his leg, holding on with all my strength. I didn't care that I was being childish. I couldn't bring myself to care how silly I looked. I couldn't bring myself to care that I was forcing myself on him. I held on with arms and legs, and I closed my eyes and willed reality to not be real. I willed the goodbye away, I willed the ending away.

He tried to pry me loose. He tried to talk me into letting go. He told me how it was for the best, how we would both be better off without each other. He said it would never work. He said it didn't matter how long I held on, eventually my strength would waver and he would shake me off and walk away. He said I was delaying the inevitable. He said I should just let go and let things take their course.

I held on through all his words. Through the nice ones and the harsh ones. Through the tenderness and the yelling. I held on with all my might and believed with every fiber of my being that if he would just accept that we were destined for each other, then everything would be fixed. I held on as he tried to shake me off. I held on as he began hurting me to get me off of him. I kept holding on.

But he was right. Time passed and my muscles began to ache. I held on through the pain of it, but eventually my grip loosened. My hold wavered. My shaky arms and legs began to ease off of him. He pushed me away from his leg harshly. He shook his leg like he was happy to have gotten rid of me. And he limped away without a backward glance.

In the end all my effort was wasted. In the end I had only hurt myself by holding on for so long. In the end I was left bruised, shaking and hurting, and he just walked away without harm. In the end he was ok, and I was not. 

I'll Close My Eyes

I'll close my eyes and walk blindly. I will let go of all my fear, and I will set aside my worries. I'll forget all about the thorns in my path, the boulders, the rivers of flame and all the other traps. I'll close my eyes and just trust. I will let my faith be my sight, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that I will be fine.

I'll close my eyes and just walk. I will walk in big sure steps, and I will do so without hesitation. I'll forget all the times my feet wavered, and for this moment I will break free of all my restraints and run without sight. I'll run and just trust. I will let my faith be my guide, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that no harm will touch me.

I'll close my eyes and run without care. I will run as fast as I can, and I will let the wind chase away my every last doubt. I'll forget all the times I was stuck, and for this moment I'll pretend I'm not bruised, broken or cut up. I'll breathe and just trust. I will let my faith be my healing, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that Allah is by my side.

I'll close my eyes and surrender my life completely to my faith, and I will let the peace of that surrender wash away every last trap lying in my path. I'll close my eyes and just trust. 

I Wish Things For You

I wish things for you. I wish them for you with a desperation that stems from the very cells of my bones, from those unknown pieces that make up my soul. If I could find a way to make those wishes come true I would pay any price -I would pay in blood and being. I would do all that it takes.

I wish you saw yourself for what you truly are. I wish you could take away all those extra layers and see the person that's hiding underneath. I wish you could bare the true you to yourself, and see underneath all the confusing emotions and all the demanding compulsions that float on the surface of you.

Push those feelings aside. Take away the desperate need for any other soul, strip away the obsessions and all the compulsions that come along with them. Strip away the happiness that you feel in the presence of another person, and peel back the sadness that dampens your mood when you're left alone. Look under all of those distractions and find the person that is truly you. The person that is hiding, shying away from the waves of emotions that it can't handle and can't even fathom.

When you find her in her little corner, when you finally see what has become of her, what you've done to her, take her hand and bring her forth. Pull her to the surface and ask her that question she's been dying to hear; what do you want? What is it that you desire? What does your little heart need?

Perhaps you will find that what she wants isn't what she's been getting. Perhaps you will see that what you've been giving her in her name is the opposite of what she's been wanting. Perhaps you'll notice that you've been underestimating her all along, and while you thought that you and she were weak you were wrong. She was strong, strong as the sun, but you were the moon and you hid her light from view.

Let her out. Let her out of her hidden corner, give her the freedom she needs to break out of you and help you break out of all those mad feelings that are chaining both of you down. Stop abusing her for the sake of a feeling that was born with no cause and will one day fade and disappear leaving the both of you scarred and pained. Love her more than you love any other person and stop hurting her again and again for the sake of another being.

I wish you would believe in your strength. I wish you would bet on yourself. I wish you would take a look inside you and see beyond the layers of illusions you're hiding behind. I wish you would realize that you have the power to walk away from the madness, the hurt, the lies and the the endless ups and downs. I wish you would take the time and effort to walk through a little rain and reach the rainbow on the other side.

You can. I swear, you can.

For my Jay.. 

I Always Will

You came at me. You came at me with spirit and mind. You crushed my defenses with your words, and tore away my restraints with nothing but yourself. You crashed your way into my heart and my life, and forced your love onto me.

I loved you. I loved you with all my broken pieces and with every tiny part of me. I loved you a love that was maddening, a love that shouldn't have existed. I loved you so much that I trusted you with complete abandon. The kind of trust that should never be given, and should never be had.

I gave you all of me. All and every part of me. And you took them all. You took and took until nothing was left of me. And then when you were safely locked within my heart, you stole the most precious pieces of me. You stole everything that I am. You betrayed me. You crushed me. You broke and tore me. You took away my wings and grounded me when I once flew. You smothered my fire until I no longer burned.

I hated you. I hated you with all those fibers that were the remnants of my pathetic being. I hated you with passion and when I used that to light back my fire it was of a new color that I didn't recognize. My flame was black and bloody. My flame was anger and scorn. My flame was darkness and hurt.

I nurtured the black flame and threw it at you. I lashed out with my new fire. I consumed you with that same black that you forced inside of me. And I watched you disintegrate as my poison took hold. I watched as what you did to me drove you over the edge, and I watched as you fell.

My anger calmed. My scorn faded. My black got drained. And I saw what I had done. I looked upon your broken corpse and I let my tears wash away the last of my wrath. For in the end, after your betrayal and after all was done. The truth is simple, and how I hate myself for it. I love you still. I always have, and I always will.

Inspired by Maleficent ..

My Sun

When did you become the center of my universe? Or is the better question why? Were you born my sun, or is it that I stayed in orbit around you for so long that eventually you became the sun? I am tired of my endless spinning, aren't you? Don't you wish you could catch me and set me free? Or are your wishes more along the line of catching me and holding me captive? 

Do you like being my sun? Is that it? Do you enjoy the attention I give you? Do you shine brighter because I can't stop looking at you? Do you burn hotter because I keep warming myself against you? Are you a sun because I made you one, or are you a sun because I needed one and you became it? Do I constantly need something to fixate on to survive? Did you become my sun for my own good? 

Fine. Don't answer any of the other questions,  but answer me this. If I shut my eyes and blind my sight from seeing you, will your light slowly begin to fade? If I bind myself away from your warmth would you stop burning hot and strong? If I can control myself and stop spinning around you would you stop being the center of my world? 

What I am really asking is this; can I undo what has been done? Can I unmake you as my center? Can I take away your powers as my sun? 

Silly Beliefs

I believe in magic. That quality of magic that is so extraordinary because it's so ordinary. I believe in happy endings for all those little stories that make our big novels. I believe in good, and I believe in a cosmic balance that holds millions of contradictions at peace.

I believe in the dependency of joy shining after every sadness. I believe in hope eradicating fear and I believe in faith shoving the shadows away and filling every darkness with content. I believe in good being rewarded and bad being punished. I believe in patience and fighting, and I believe they always lead to winning.

I believe in ideals that some believe are silly and naive, but I believe nonetheless. I believe in good beating the bad and I believe that the sun will shine after every darkness and I believe that no effort will ever go wasted and I believe that long patience ends in miracles -and guess what? so far, it has, they have and my beliefs aren't as silly as some believe. 

Rabbit Hole

I fell down the rabbit hole. I wasn't looking and my feet tripped, and down the hole I tumbled and went. The fall put me to sleep and when I woke the world was not the world anymore.

I found myself in an odd little place where the laws of physics were bent and skewed. Right was left, and left was up and down was all around the place. The ground was blue and the sky was green and the clouds were trees and the trees were none. The lights were too bright and too dim and the sounds were so loud they were soft.

The doors were walls and walls were windows that lead to the sky. The roads went in circles and the circles broke and didn't break. The air was heavy and the water too light. The people had no faces and the faces had no people to claim.

And I? I was a mass of floating papers filled with words that made no sense. Among all the madness I was madder than all and the world of opposites was less mad than I. I roamed in a gait that was falling in steps and I ran with hands rather than feet. I swam on land and walked through seas and I breathed in sand that turned to clay. And then I fell and into the sky I tumbled and went.

Years had passed. The world had kept spinning while I was away. But I did not despair and nor did I care. I was back, and right was right, left was left and up was all around the place. The ground was green and the sky was blue and the clouds were unbound and free. I was home and I was I, and the world was it.

I Want to Write

I want to write. I don't mean that I simply want to empty my mind of all the words it carries, I mean true writing. I want more out of this hobby of mine and I want more for it.

I want to draw paintings with my words. I want to create pictures that you can see with your eyes using nothing but generic little letters strung together. I want those letters to dance to a symphony that is the sentences they make and I want them to merge together into a portrait with more dimensions than should be possible. I want all those wordy images to move against each other with the fluidity and grace of dense mercury.

I want my words to feed off each other and become more than mere words. I want them to say more than they were created to say and I want them to scream magic louder than voices were ever meant to scream. I want my words to be art and power intermingled into letters that hit you right in the heart of your soul and make you feel against your will.

I want to write so when you break the lines apart and see what ink made the words you find mind, spirit and soul. I want to write feelings as though they are a language I am explaining to the deaf and blind. I want my words to radiate passion and I want them to ignite inspiration as they burn through and through. I want them to scar their way off the page and I want them to leave irrevocable trace.

I want to write the way writing was meant to be done -I want to write art that inherently imprints change. I want to write. 

Let Go

I learned a while back that whatever we feel, we usually make ourselves feel it. If something feels difficult, yes the world might have played a role in making it feel difficult, but ultimately it's us.

We choose how to perceive things, we choose to hold on to our discomfort and we choose to see the negative among all the positive. The contradictions that we feel we usually bring to ourselves just because we can't let go enough to enjoy what our minds want us to feel and enjoy.

We have these ideas in our heads of who we're supposed to be and what we're supposed to be like. I hate comfort and human contact, I am strong and I should never fall apart, I am this and I am that. We hold on to those ideas so strongly -with everything we have and we bury those parts of us that need and want more.

And then when those tiny little parts that feel oh so much, and are hurting oh so much, and suffocating oh so much finally manage to break to the surface and make themselves known. We're too caught up with who we think we are to let who we really are out.

We find ourselves conflicted and we ask what's wrong, and all that's wrong is that we can't let go. We're in our own way. We can't break free of our ideas to let what is true come out.

But once you realize that's what the matter is, once you understand that you are holding you back, that you're the reason for all the conflict and all the contradictions, then you can slowly begin to unbind all those silly little ties and start letting go enough to feel what you need to feel, however way you need to feel it.

You have the power. The complete and whole power and you can break free of whatever is holding you back and you can finally breathe. All you truly have to do is remember to take a breath and feel the wind in your lungs. All you truly have to do is let go, and inhale. 

I'm Afraid

I'm afraid. 

There, I said it. I put the words down, and I can't take them back. I can't delude myself into thinking it isn't true, and I can't hide in my safe little corners of denial. My fear is real, it is overwhelming and it's threatening to win. 

I'm afraid. Of what? Ask me what I'm not afraid of, that would make a better question. But I will tell you nonetheless. I will write my fears down, and hope that if they slip out through my fingers and into actual words, they might lose some of their strength. Perhaps if I write them down I can win. 

I'm afraid of what might come next. I'm afraid of my own weakness, of my own lack. I'm afraid of not deserving good things, and I'm afraid that I can't handle the bad things I deserve. I'm afraid of not being strong enough. 

I'm afraid that everything I fear will come true, and everything I hope will blow into smoke. I'm afraid of breaking and falling apart, and I'm afraid that this time I won't be able to put the pieces back together. I'm afraid of a shattered mind, and a soul so torn apart there won't be coming back. 

I'm afraid of a future similar to my past. I'm afraid of disappointment. I'm afraid of .. I'm afraid of failure. I'm afraid of being afraid. And I'm afraid that I'll never stop being afraid. I'm afraid that I allowed myself to be so hurt, so broken that fear has etched itself into my cells and integrated itself into who I am. 

Dear God, I'm afraid. I'm afraid grown up fears that can fight their own battles. You can fight away the illogical, but when fear becomes logical, that's when it threatens to win.

I'm afraid. 

That & Those

That laugh that turns into a sob.
Those unshed tears that turn into rocks.
Those unspoken words that bind and lock.

That confusion that turns into loss.
Those loud instincts that turn and toss.
Those restless feelings that turn into chaos.

That strength that turns into dust.
Those ignored pains that refuse to be hushed.
Those soul clenching fears that cannot be crushed.

That laugh that turns into a sob.
Those unshed tears that fall and drop.
Those unspoken words that are free to throb.

That confusion that turns into loss.
Those loud instincts that turn into thoughts.
Those restless feelings that speak and talk.

That strength that can't turn to dust.
Those unignored pains that have been hushed.
Those soul clenching fears -with hope are crushed.

Vortex

There's an emptiness within me. A slow spreading disease that is nothing, working its way inside of me, consuming everything it finds in its path. I can feel it changing me, coloring all my parts in a hue that is a non-color, painting me with it and dipping me in it whole. I can feel it sucking the life, the particles, the positive and the negative out of me, and undoing them until nothing is left but a lack that is absolute.

I am changing. My body, consumed by the emptiness, is turning into nothing but a black hole. A vacuum, a vortex held in an illusion of a person. I can feel it spreading and taking me over, like a venom coursing through my veins and working its way between my cells. How do I stop it? How do you stop nature from taking its course? How do you reverse what has already begun?

I am frightened. The vacuum slowly begins to pull the people surrounding me into itself. It tries to draw them into the emptiness. To infect them with what I am. I keep trying to keep it locked and safe so it has nothing to consume except me -except itself. But how do you keep people from getting pulled into a vortex when they keep reaching into the emptiness? How can you keep them safe when they won't step away from the edge?

I wish I knew. All I know is I am losing my battle. The black hole has nearly sucked me into myself whole, my particles are gone and I am a non-color. I can see people being pulled by the vortex that is me, and I want to save them. But how can you save others when you couldn't save yourself? How can you save others when the danger is yourself? It's simple.. You try, but ultimately, you can't, and you don't. 

The Simple Things

I love walking. I love that I have legs and a body that can keep up with how much my brain needs us to walk. I love running as fast as my too slow legs can take me, and feeling the wind in my hair and leaving my worries in my trail. I love feeling my heart pulsing in every inch of my body, and for those few minutes feeling alive and beating.

I love that I can enjoy my own company. I love that being alone doesn't scare me, that I crave spending time away from the world more than I crave being with it. I love being in my own little bubble, away from the pull of everyone around me and feeling unbound and safe. I love hearing my own thoughts as I breathe in silence, and seeing the images of my mind as I revel in the darkness.

I love reading. I love that I have an imagination that allows me to create worlds out of books and to live in them. I love how engrossing a book can be, and how willing I am to let go of reality and surrender to the beauty of fiction. I love that I don't need a ritual to read, all I need is a book and my mind and I am gone. I love that I can read for hours on end no matter where I am, or what surrounds me.

I love that I can smile. I love that no matter how much my brain is weeping inside, I can always find it in me to smile and laugh. I love that tears and worries don't break me, and that I can always chase them away with a happy thought. I love that I have enough positivity in me to outbalance all the negative, and I love that when I feel like screaming I can smile instead.

I love that I rarely get bored. I love that I love picking up new skills. I love that I am independent. I love that I am fully self-serviceable and functional. I love that I have amazing family and friends. I love that I can be as evil as I am nice. I love that I am ocpd, and I love that I can control it. I love that I can list so many small things that I love about myself and my life. I love that I can probably go on listing forever.

You have to appreciate what God has given you. It's the simple things that we take most for granted, and they are the things that truly make or break us. Sometimes you just need to stop and appreciate all the things you have, and smile to yourself and let the words el 7amdlillah come out honest and true from deep inside of you. El 7amdlillah. 

Stirring of the Soul

I feel inadequate. I feel like my life, who I am, everything that I love about myself is wasting away instead of being put to use. I feel a strong urge, no, a need, a primal basic need to become something of importance, to leave an imprint in this world, to influence change, to be heard, to be somebody.

I feel frustrated and mad and sad that I am stuck where I am, shackled to this point in time and space and life. I feel.. I feel nostalgic for something I never had, and for half-forgotten dreams that loom broken in my subconscious waiting for something, but what? I don't know.

I feel like I am missing out on my own destiny. Like every cell in my body knows that I am meant to have a voice that ripples through this world, that I was made for a greater purpose, that I was created to make a difference but I am not and my body, my cells, my very soul ache for that destiny.

I feel impatient for this plateau to pass and for me to reach those heights I am meant to reach. I feel smothered by myself, like a part of me is holding the rest of me back and I don't know how to let go and break free -I don't know how to fly even though I was born with wings.

I feel that and so much more, and it is always triggered by stories of great people and inspiring events. Like being in close proximity to such things gives my soul a brief flash, a tiny reminder that this is what you were created for. And in return my soul writhes and twists, agonizing over being hidden away from our destiny. But that is ok, it's ok to pine after greatness. If what you see doesn't affect you in any way then are you truly living? If being in the presence of greatness doesn't make your mind itch for change then are you truly ever present?

I wish so much that I could find it in me to get unstuck. I wish I had the creativity, the genius to move along and start living my fate. I wish I could fast forward to that future I miss so much, and my nostalgic soul could finally rest knowing I am doing what I was meant to do, I am who I was always meant to be. I wish so many things but all I can do is wait, bide my time and find it in me to trust that this rut is where I need to be right now, so that tomorrow I can be where my soul needs to be.

The dull ache of all those heavy feelings and desperate wishes is and will always be a part of who I am, burning through me like a gentle, constant reminder that this lost, shackled and voiceless girl will grow up and leave her mark.

2013

I Wish

I wish for clarity. Not the clarity of sight, but clarity of the mind. The kind of clarity that comes with a sharp focus, and allows you to see things for what they truly are. I wish I had clarity that can battle the thickest clouds of feelings, fears and bias, and allows me to see the true shape of the world. Not the pictures and images, but the tiny little dots that make the lines that make the colors that paint those images. I wish for clarity in all things, clarity to chase away all the haziness.

I wish for strength of will. Not the will that takes control and strength to stay intact, but the kind of will that is inherently strong and keeps you controlled and intact. The kind of will that makes no obstacle ever seem too big to climb. I wish I had a will that can take hard choices and impossible decisions and carry them through. The kind of will that allows me to change myself and the world with nothing but the power it gives me to keep going. I wish for strength of will in all things, strength of will to put all my words into actions.

I wish for patience. Not the short term patience that doesn't stand the test of time, but that inanimate patience that spreads over years and through pure desperation. I wish I had patience that can hold me at peace when life rises in absolute chaos around me. The kind of patience that lends the soul stillness and content, and a deep rooted knowledge that waiting is the key. The kind of patience that is never ending, inconsumable, and limitless. I wish for patience in all things, patience to fight away the restlessness.

I wish. 

Thoughtless

Sometimes we find ourselves coasting along with life's currents, letting them pull and push us any way they want. It's so easy to just surrender to those forces, to be on autopilot and let the wind and water guide you where they may. It isn't surrender or even trust, it's more being thoughtless and forgetting that if we aren't conscious of where life takes us, we might end up in the wrong place, or worse yet, we might end up being the wrong kind of person.

I've been so thoughtless. I chose the settings I am comfortable with and switched off my mind, allowing my body to go where it may. But even if you set a boat on a certain course, unless you monitor it, its path can change. My path changed when I wasn't looking. A couple of storms, a few innocent gusts of wind, waves in a certain direction and suddenly I've woken to find myself away from everything I wanted myself to be.

I feel so sad. I know that I can get myself back on the right path, that I can ride the currents and not let them master me anymore. But I am still sad. I mourn all that wasted time. I mourn all those thoughtless twists and turns. I mourn all those wasted opportunities. But alas, nothing can be done to fix the past, and so I must accept it and move on.

I want to be a good person. I want to make a conscious choice every single day to better myself. I want to look back on the person I was yesterday and be able to say today I'm a better person. I want to be able to do that every single day of my life, and I want the person that one day goes under the sand to be a million times better than the person I am today. I want to collect good deeds, and I want to look at myself and think that I am a good person, and I want God to think that too.

It isn't easy to wake up and realize that you don't think you're a good person. It doesn't mean you're bad, it just means you aren't actively trying to be good. It means you aren't making an effort. It means you've  been thoughtless. I wish I hadn't been thoughtless for this long. I wish I'd woken up sooner. I wish I was a better person today, but the truth is, I was a better person yesterday. 

You Can't Beat Me

Are you trying to scare me by flexing your muscles? You want to show me that you're stronger? That you can take me? Go ahead. Be my guest. Take your best shot. But I promise you, no, I swear to you, I swear on everything that has ever been holy and precious, I will make you work for it.

It doesn't matter that you are stronger, it doesn't matter how big and scary you are. I have endurance, more of it than you'll ever see coming. You will hit me, you will punch me, you will bruise and break me but I swear to you that I will just keep getting up.

My strongest attempt to fight back might be painless and pathetic to you, but it doesn't even matter. You know why? Because you can beat me to a pulp but you will never win. You can't beat a person that always gets back up. You can't beat a person that never gives up. You can't beat a person that has more will and tolerance than you can even begin to understand.

You have physical strength, you have the ability to break me and tear me limb from limb, but one thing you don't have is the ability to break my spirit. I have spirit. I have will. I have tolerance. I have anger. I have hunger. I will not go down. I will never go down. The more you hit me the stronger I become. The worse you break me the faster I will rise.

Your own aggression, your own strength will work against you and you will grow slow and tired from hurting me. I will let you waste all your impressive strength and I will take everything you have to offer in stride and I will fight it all with patience. And when you've drained yourself proving you're stronger, and your body has lost all its precious strength, then, then I will beat you.

I will let out all my anger, all my frustration, all my hurt and all my pent up energy and I will take you down. And unlike me you don't have the spirit to take it. You don't have the will. You don't have my kind of strength; the strength of mind and character. And you will fall. And I will win. I swear to you I will win. I swear it. 

Contradictions

The pieces I write are always dark and twisted. There's always some form of misery, sadness, despair, weakness and fear. It's strange. It's the best I know how to write. And yet in real life I'm the complete opposite. I don't know how to wallow in the negative, I live and breathe positives and I'm generally a genuinely happy and hopeful person.

The contradiction is intriguing. I wish I had the wit to understand it for all it means. As much as I can understand people, I can't understand myself. I'm a walking bundle of contradictions that confuses even me sometimes. I have rules that make no sense that I can put into easy words, and yet I am convinced of their rightness.

I guess the reason I don't understand a lot of things about myself is that I don't bother to question them too much. Some things I just accept, embrace and welcome. I mean, I trust my brain. It might not always share its reasoning with me, but the times it does it makes sense, and so I trust that it has reasons and they're good.

If I don't feel comfortable around a certain person specifically then I accept that some part of my brain picked something up that made it uncomfortable. If I don't trust someone even after they've proven themselves to me, I trust that my brain has a damn good reason.

I trust my mind, and I trust that there are some deep rooted reasons for all my contradictions. I don't questions my quirks, I don't question my oddities, I don't question the convoluted way my rules work, I don't question those weird feelings and instincts that make no sense. Because they are a part of me and I love them, and when you love something you accept it, and you work with it, and you trust it.

I love that silent part of me that controls more of my life than the conscious part of me does, I love it with all I've got. And so I'll accept the contradictions it rears up. I'll keep writing my sad, dark pieces and I'll keep living my happy, sunny life. Maybe the reason I'm happy is that my writings aren't. Maybe the reason I'm positive is that my writings are negative. I don't know. But it is what it is. And I love it. 

I Guess I'll Never Learn

I stood on the edge of the world, that point where earth ended and nothing began. My heart was pounding in my chest, and my lungs were desperately trying to keep up with its harsh pace. My eyes were closed, I'd chosen blissful ignorance while I could. But ignorance can only last so long. I knew that eventually I would have to open my eyes and face reality, and I dreaded it with a soul clinching despair.

I take as deep a breath as my lungs allow me, and I slowly peel my lids back. What I see makes my heart pound even faster, something I hadn't thought was possible. A thick blanket of fear covers me from head to toe, and my limbs start shaking uncontrollably. I keep staring at the bottomless pit and it feels as though it is staring back. It's shrouded in darkness and mystery, not the peaceful darkness that promises hope of the unseen, but a darkness that's alive with shadows and creatures that no man dare ever speak of.

I wanted this, I wanted to do this, I wanted to be here, I wanted to jump. I keep repeating that to myself, a mantra to drive away the mind numbing fear that threatens to overwhelm me. But the words are like a soft breeze caught in the middle of a storm, they brush my mind and escape without leaving a trace or causing any change.

I hear sounds behind me and I know that my audience is approaching, they are coming to witness my jump into frightening unknowns. I can feel their excited energy bubbling behind me, I can almost see the cloud of eagerness surrounding them. And just like that my fear shrinks back. It doesn't disappear, it merely recedes from my outsides and leaves me looking calm and eager while it storms around inside of me wreaking havoc.

They stand beside me and they look into the darkness. Whatever they see it isn't what I see because they smile and their excitement rises. They clap me on the back and urge me to jump. I am afraid beyond words, so afraid I fear that I might die from sheer fright, but I smile because that is what I do best. I smile to cover up the storms in my eyes, I smile to keep their insides safe from my insides.

I jump. I jump and my heart jumps to my throat and I hope to god that the fall doesn't break me, that it doesn't tear me limb from limb. I watch them as I fall, waving and smiling at me and I smile back around my fear for as long as they can see me. Once the darkness swallows me, I let my fear out to paint my face in terror. When I've fallen long enough to be sure they can't hear me, I unlock my lips and let my fear out in ragged screams and endless tears.

My hopes crash around me like a tower of glass, and I end up broken. The fall breaks me, breaks me a million times over and over again, and in the end it just keeps breaking me. Sometimes fear is justified, sometimes the shadows are monsters, and sometimes a bottomless pit doesn't mean you get to soar, it means you never stop falling and hurting. But even knowing that I don't wish I hadn't jumped. I guess I am foolish, I guess I'll never learn to listen. 

I Lost Again

I lie in bed surrounded by peaceful darkness, but the inside of my mind is anything but peaceful. Time passes by, painfully slow, and I watch as the world slowly winds down, all those awake voices slowly dying out until the silence is alive with whispers of deep breaths. Everything and everyone around me falls into an effortless sleep, and I stay awake, watching and listening. As always, that first brush of slumber manages to elude me, not caring that I was the first to invite it in.

The very Earth begins to snore, a new instrument joining the symphony of deep breathing and dreams, and that is my cue, my signal to let out a labored, pained sigh. I rise from my bed and begin my preparations, sliding my armors in place and holding my choice of weapons. I stand there dressed for my eternal battle, awaiting my opponent, my own personal monster to appear.

"Where are you?" I yell impatiently, "Are you afraid tonight might be the night I beat you?"

I fall silent, waiting for a response that comes in the form of a dark, chilling chuckle that raises the hair on the back of my neck, and covers my flesh in tiny little bumps. I tighten my hold on my weapons as Insomnia appears, and I am once again face to face with a malicious grin plastered on a face too bright to be seen, ready to keep me from the shore of Sleep.

He gives another evil laugh, and then he strikes and the battle begins. My skill level is no longer up to par with his. My mind was once canny and sharp, but the endless fighting has taken its toll and now my reflexes are sluggish and slow. My limbs are loose and frail, my eyes itch and burn, my head is heavy and pained -my entire body is weak and falling apart. But I am cursed, and curses don't lift because you are tired, and so I must fight through the dwindling of my flame and hope against despair that I find victory.

More and more time passes, and I am left with nothing but strength of will and soul to spur me on. My mind gives up and begins its favorite chant of despair; it urges me to give in and stop this torturous battle. I suddenly find myself fighting two foes, one from without and one from within. I desperately cling to my will, I try to clear the mist and fog my mind has wrought up and blow it all away with sheer resolve but it is unyielding.

I am lost in a storm of hazy emotions, my mind and body fight against me, my will slowly loses its spark and time aligns itself with the rest of the army trying to knock me off my feet. I fight a battle I am doomed to lose even though by all rights I have already lost, but I fight nonetheless and I keep fighting and I will keep fighting until I can't fight anymore.

The first rays of the sun appear, my heart sinks and Insomnia laughs victoriously. The sun lends him strength, and he pushes me farther and farther away from Sleep. With one last strike I fall to my knees, and I am defeated once more. I stare at the treacherous sun with dry eyes, too used to losing to shed any tears. Insomnia retreats to his hide out, the sun burns me with its heat and I fall to the ground, sinking into a restless fake sleep. Tonight, I lost again. 

Stop Trying, Stop Pretending

Stop trying to protect me. Stop trying to protect yourself. Can't you see that the more you try to protect us, the more we hurt? Can't you see that you're our biggest enemy?

Stop pretending reality isn't real. Stop shying away from the truth. Can't you see that just because we cannot see doesn't mean it is gone? Can't you see that by hiding from the knife it cuts deeper? 

Stop trying to run from me. Stop trying to run from yourself. Can't you see that the longer you run, the longer we have to run? Can't you see that we cannot outrun ourselves? 

Stop pretending you aren't hurt. Stop acting strong and whole. Can't you see that just because we can be weak doesn't mean we aren't strong? Can't you see that only when things are broken can they heal? 

Stop trying to keep me sane. Stop trying to keep yourself sane. Can't you see that the longer you keep it away, the longer it will stay? Can't you see that staying sane is the true insanity? 

Stop pretending that you are helping. Stop deluding yourself into thinking this is working. Can't you see that your good intentions are destroying us both? Can't you see that our life is falling apart because of you?

Hand over the reins, please, give them here and let me lead the way for once. My way might hurt us both, but sometimes burning pains are the only way to be reborn.

Give me your hand, and let us walk through the flames together, and I promise you I will help us rise out of the ashes strong and whole. Please let's face our pain, no more hiding, no more running -let us be brave. 

Let's Be At Peace

Let's be at peace, let's forget the world, forget reality and forget everything. Let's sit on the shore and do little else. Let's watch the waves crashing against the sand and see nothing more. Let's hear the sound of the ocean and ignore what our brains have to say. Let's smile over nature's beauty, let's breathe in the fresh air and let's forget all the reasons we're crying, and all the reasons we can't breathe.

Let's sink in the salty water and feel it cleanse our skins, let's pretend the water can go into our souls and wash them anew. Let's float on the waves and feel the pull of the ocean, and let's forget all those other strings that hold us caged. Let's bask in the glow of the sun and let its warmth fill us scalp to soles and let's forget the bone chilling cold that never quite leaves.

Let's pretend the world has been reduced to the ocean, the sun and the wind. Let's pretend there's no more to our lives than this imaginary moment, and let's hold on to it with all our might. Let's say goodbye and let's just go live on the shore. Let's be at peace, let's forget the world, forget reality and forget everything. 

I Fade Away

I wake with a start. A nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach tells me that I shouldn't have been sleeping. I stand too quickly, my eyes flickering madly around, trying to see everything around me all at once.

Fear courses through my veins, icy cold and razor sharp. I try to scream but no sound leaves my throat. Tears start spilling from my eyes. The panic reaches my legs and I start running. Fear and hurt spur me on, pushing me at an unbelievable pace as I try to find a way out.

My vision is blurry with tears, and I convince myself that they're the reason for what I see. It can't be true. It can't be real. I blink a million times and my eyes are finally clear of the salty water. The world remains the same. It's impossible, and yet it's true.

I am in the middle of nothing. Like a nightmare, except that it's reality. I can see for miles and miles ahead but the world has been reduced to nothing. There isn't anything in sight, just a pure, painful white light. The light chokes me and I try to scream again. Nothing.

I keep running, hoping to see anything other than nothing, but there isn't anything to be seen. More tears drop from my eyes, and I watch as they disappear as soon as they hit the emptiness. The world was erasing any trace that I could have left. As though I was a part of the nothingness. As though I didn't exist.

I push my legs to run faster. I desperately try to stifle the panic that is flooding my mind. I search around me for something to ease the tightness in my chest. I get more desperate by the minute. My run is wild and uncoordinated. My breathing is ragged and half choked. I trip on my own feet and I fall.

Falling feels surreal -surely gravity would pull me faster than this? But it doesn't and I keep falling, painfully slow. I wait an endless wait for me to hit the ground. More fear and pain explode in my chest. I fear being lost, I hurt at being alone.

I continue falling, unable to scream, my tears falling faster than I am. They touch the bottom of the empty whiteness and disappear before my eyes. I know I am close to the bottom, and I am shocked to find myself able to scream. As soon as that first wave of sound escapes my lips, my body and my voice are swallowed up by the empty light.

I fade away.

2010

Walk a Mile in my Shoes

Walk a mile in my shoes. Go ahead, take them, try them for fit. They're not quite right? It's ok, they don't fit me that well either, but I still wear them, I still walk in them. Are you afraid to take that first step? I understand. It's scary. But you have to take it. You can't stand here forever.

Walk a mile in my shoes. Go ahead, walk and I'll walk with you, I'll measure the distance and I'll count the steps. You're getting tired? It's ok, I get tired as well, but I keep walking anyway. Are you afraid of getting hurt? I understand. It's frightening. But you have to face it. You can't shy away from it forever.

Walk a mile in my shoes. Go ahead, walk until the mile ends, see what it's like to be me. You're starting to lose it? It's ok, I think I'm losing it too, but I still keep going, I still keep walking. Are you afraid you won't make it? I understand. It's terrifying. But you have to see it through. You won't find out unless you try.

Walk a mile in my shoes. Go ahead, tell me what it was like, tell me how you feel. You're falling apart? You're in pain? It's hard? It's ok, I feel that way too, at least you only had to do a mile, I have to keep walking in them. Are you afraid for me? I understand. It's petrifying. I'm afraid too. But I have to live with it. I can't just stand in the same place forever. I have to keep walking miles and miles in these shoes.