☆¡!

maybe i should have wanted less. maybe i should have ignored the bowl in me burning to be filled. maybe i should have wanted less.

Yes, I say, because I do not have the words to tell her how heavy the world feels; how it asks so much of me, again and again, until I crumple from pure exhaustion. How I am so desperately afraid I will never find someone who loves me completely, not as much as I love them. How I will always be a step behind, the third person on the sidewalk, eagerly pouring love into the pockets of everyone I meet, until I have none left even for myself. 

When will you feel better? She asks.

When I am thirty, I want to say. After the exams, after the job, after feeling like I don’t fit in anywhere. When I have found that person. When I have children and a front lawn for them to play on. When I know how the world moves. When I am happy. 

But I look at her; at the deep wrinkles between her eyes, at the drawer where her wedding band sits, put out of sight. Maybe it is a lie. Maybe thirty comes without happiness. Maybe it isn’t something that arrives; maybe it has to be forced.