living myth

long gone are the days of welcomed contemplation. fear and exhaustion has taken place of desperate analysis. i run from my own thoughts with aching lungs and trembling fingertips. 

they say the look in my eye reminds them of a cat watching from the darkened corner of a room; that the way i walk, and the way i talk, is practiced, quiet, fickle, playful, observant. that they cannot separate the two in their mind, from my smile to how my heart mourns every moment not spent off the ground. they say it’s almost incredible-- i think it’s far too flattering. 

i will forever worry i could never compare to anything beyond a mutt whining at your heels, tunnel-vision eyes narrowly focused on your bead of light, tail wagging while panting to the rhythm of my heart for you. 

the melodic voice of the wind, from its whistles to the way its breath rustles the leaves, swept me off my feet as soon as my eyes could comprehend the horizon line and my heart felt the first pangs of a longing ache to abandon thoughts of home for the intoxicating concept of experiencing what the rest of the world sees when they look up at the sky, and their trees, and the texture of the paint on their walls. a wanderlust i never grew out of.  it’s the ache in my heart that tells me i would like to live forever and yet not another day within the same beat; escapism at its finest. that seductive desire to know what the world is like without having to bloody my hands and wear my throat raw with its jagged edges. to balance just on the precipice of being a part of something deeper than the gaze of my curious mind.

i bite and tear at tangled threads daringly called thoughts, teeth sharpened by years of war and self sacrifice. to simultaneously focus in and out on my mind is a habit i know well, eyes blurred with the tears i rarely have the energy to cry and an exhaustion i cannot seem to shake. it’s times like these that i muse over how my child self would undoubtedly agree that this objective introspection marred by self deprecation and a flighty ego is a nasty hobby to have.

it is rare that my words elude me, yet in one fell swoop you’ve managed to silence my mind for days. i despise the fog of betrayal that’s clouded my thoughts, how difficult it has become to even breathe. my chest tightens just seeing you, my psyche running in circles yet suspended in time all at once. i had forgotten just how hard a pill to swallow broken trust is. 

i have so many scars; scars i cannot remember when or how i got them. it seems like i have a new one everyday. maybe they come to me in dreams? a mere haunting given permanence, a reminder for a soul who can’t seem to remember anything these days. 

with desperation, i claw at the air and earth. my bitten lips part, a yearning whisper tearing past them, “sink into me; i wish to feel something.”

isolation took root in my bones when i was just a child, ghosting my blood like a phantom sentenced to bear the chains of its resting place. i’ve become resigned to the way it follows me; seeping into everything i try to achieve. still, there is a sorrow to this doomed acceptance of mine.