wtf is an article?
There’s a way to live with a little self compassion and a way to live without it. Enough to help yourself make humane and (insert: opposite of masochistic, but not sadistic) decisions. I saw the light leave your eyes when I asked you to consider derailing your compulsions, and you set your mouth in a closed curved line, you listened and you heard nothing. You want it your way, chug chug chugging like a work train around an oval track, back to where you began in less time than it takes to change the subject. Screeching wheels, loud to drown out anything you don’t want to hear, and smokey engine car coloring the air between us black and thick.
There’s rain coming after two long days of naked blue sky, sun bright like a bare bulb in a closet. The world glowed yellow like buttercups under a baby’s chin.
Sleep feels like a job I show up for. On fumes, my faith burned black like the coals from your train car. Running feels like work. Waking up feels like work. My own authenticity misplaced, waiting for me somewhere back in March. Or early April. Too many distractions to feel at home. Haven’t tried hard enough. Haven’t shown back up like I usually do after this long. Shaken and wet like a lost dog ready for a bath. My arms are open now, I’m calling me back home. Leaving the lights on long past nightfall. Skin feels like someone else’s. Want to be back in my body again. Want to sleep with myself, warm and sound and complete, like a rock in the sun.
My walls are bare. Sudden loss of interest in things you once loved. Not so sudden and not so lost. My apartment feels like part of me, like it would hug me back if I found the right angle. This was the change they were talking about, the one I thought skipped over me. Distinct forward momentum, tunnel-vision, metamorphosing.
Life (insert: anything works here) is only fun when you treat yourself like a human. Machines can’t make decisions based on bizarre personal values and transient feelings like I can. Runner’s high, a gift. Breathe through open mouth smile. Stretch. Hinge in half like a doll hanging loose, hot blood in my face, crown of my head to the sidewalk. See the world upside down, my neighbor’s house, my driveway. Stay there. Look at the beauty, dark green bushes illuminated by the dying yellow light of day. Upside down, dark green and concrete covered earth at the top of my vision where the sky usually is. The sky where the ground should be. My feasting eyes. World upside down, backlit by white sun. Burned into my busy brain.
