#dignissimus

.

I said

In a singsong voice

Almost proudly

But I'm not, am I?

If anything, I'm their pride

Eldest child for my grandparents

First one to get into this uni

(Best in the country

[Not even aunt Denise got in,

And now she's a teacher in another.

PhD like I wish I could be] )

Working

At a multinational giant

(Of my own karmic design

But does that even mean anything

Now that I'm in?)

Blonde, blue-eyed cheerleader

(yes, I once was one)

Has the perfect boyfriend and a perfect life

Like they said

Between gritted envious teeth.

.

I get it

That's what they see

They're not wrong

Just wish I saw my merit in all of this

I didn't earn my eyes, my hair

The steps that got me this far

Were given to me

I didn't earn any of this

I met hawk by chance

And he stuck with me when I didn't want him

Before I got to want him

So was it really my doing?

These things I've

"earned"

I look at them and see nothing but pure luck

I was lucky to get in

One in one hundred and seventy

Among twenty seven thousand one hundred and twenty six

Tell me if that's not luck

Twenty fifth place in one hundred and twenty

Of at least nine dot three times that

(Which makes it

One thousand one hundred and sixteen

But that was after the bulk got knocked out

How many may it have been?

Who tries for my path anyway?)

It was

Luck

Not merit

And even if it was merit

Look at me

Look at what I've done with this

All the years I've hid away in failure

And even now that I got this far I still struggle to walk on stubbed toes

I write this outside of downtime because my hands will not type anything else

I make a penny

Corn makes a dime

That's why I cry on company time

Haha

Pathetic.

.

It's not a merit if you never deserved it

If you don't work for it even after getting it

If you don't enjoy it and make it worth your time

It's not

And I'm wasting these

Which I only ever want to keep

So nobody else calls me what I call myself

When I look at myself in the mirror

And see anything that isn't eagle.

.

"but I'm here, bitch. And I'm fabulous."

.

( My only merit in these times

This year

Is I can say for sure

I've saved a life or two with my words.

I'm thankful they're still around.

But that

Is really

.

.

.

Before it all began, before I knew what dragons were, back when I was still hearing stories of lost little foreign girls and fermented drinks, before I knew how to sing about power outages and task nostalgia

I knew the birds.

the tiny birds who flew across the fields like scattered schools of fish, chasing after bugs, after each other, after the wind, after the sun

split-tail tiny birds, faster than any vehicle, flying overhead as if their paths could make a roof for that wild tunnel

I call them swallows out of partial ignorance, out of daydreams. Swallows like the one I became few years later. Swallows like the ones I gulped down in hope I'd grow wings of my own.

I didn't notice their disappearance, only saw it after they were already gone. Their bugs, their others, their wind, their sun, taken away.

Or perhaps they got tired of flying over me.

Still

I know them.

And they know me.

Since way before it all.

.

.

.

It's like I told Newton and his eyes, his green obsidian eyes.

I'll manage it someday.

.

It's... a very toxic, privileged mindset, the one that all that you get from the life around you is your responsibility. That if you succeed, the golden laurels are all yours, and that if you don't, even if you did your best and you were crippled in your reach by outside forces, it was all your fault. You let yourself be crippled, for whatever reason, by whatever means.

Very dangerous, very aggressive, this mindset.

But it does bring some growth at times.

.

I could point fingers all I wanted.

"you did this to me, even in low tide that was the best thing that had ever happened to me, it was all I had, and you took it away, just this isn't enough anymore"

But what would you say? What could you do?

'Sorry' doesn't cut it. Doesn't take away the pain. But there's nothing you could do, nothing you would do.

You didn't stab me, you just held out a knife, and I went in to hug you, lodging it on my guts. I can't blame you. Its of no use to blame you.

It's not worth talking to you directly about it, either. "Closure", they said, trying to cheer me up, what closure? What would I gain? Telling you how hurt I am over what cannot be changed? I'm trying to recover, but this is past my self-absorption and low self-esteem, this is me reclaiming myself piece by piece. I need to do this by myself.

I can't rely on you constantly, and i don't want to. I'm learning to be ok with myself, and with this. "What matters is not what the world has done to you, but what you do with what the world has done to you".

.

Although, I'll be honest. I never truly believed a heartbreak is only healed with a new love. A heartbreak is healed with self-love, and inner peace. I'm not ready for this, I don't want it, not now, not like this.

But it's not like I have an option by now, do I? Not after what we did.

Net wa kyet Peri.

.

*sigh*

the only person I can never say 'no' to is myself

.

.

.

but I did

I did it so many times

I did it so well and so often

it's almost second nature

I did

"you chose to"

no

I had no choice

I didn't feel like I had a choice

I was made to

I was taught to

.

.

.

he only cries alone or when he's drunk out of his mind

when he can't point fingers and spit out flames anymore

you cry out of words if they hit you right

just like me

but I saw you cry first

I didn't know what it meant to you

but I knew what it meant to me

it doesn't matter that I was so young

it doesn't matter that I didn't know better then

when you make a decision like that, it's etched in your veins for life

I guess that's what I was trying to cut out

.

.

.

I can never hurt you

I can never do you wrong

I'm not allowed to

I can't hate you

I see your flaws and I see where you did me wrong but I don't have the voice to say it

I love you in ways other than I should because that's what you get when you flip it upside down

I promised Id never become one of those pesky rebellious teens

I never did

not to you

you never knew

you never could know

it'd hurt you

it'd hurt me even more to see I did it

I do it

but you must never know

I'm sorry

I'm sorry

I'm sirry

I'm sorry

I'm sorry

I'm sorry