#hereislight

an incomplete list of poetry quotes i can’t ever forget about:

dress him up in quiet clothes put no demons in his pockets pin no darkness to the insides of his sleeves put a flower between his shoulderblades ashes on his knees a petal on his tongue a funeral pyre of the softest wood under his back it will be drenched in blood; I touched it tell him not to mourn it as he lies there waiting for fire this is what he can’t save after I leave don't mention me don't mention the dead and the way you can almost see them sometimes tell him that if I had outlived him, I would have put my name on his grave and it would have been the truth let it be the last time he suffers I imagine a life after him years from now i'm in some place different where there's a bar and barlights empty stools and i will tell the bartender of him but he will have another name and i won't mention the part where i broke him down to tears they will ask if he loved me and I will say yes and there will be a silence (they will think he deserved it, if he loved a wretched thing) and I will say his death was also mine because this future doesn’t exist anyway I will die before him, in front of him on the marble steps quiet clothes with demons in their pockets and darkness on the insides of their sleeves no flower between my shoulderblades ashes on my knees my mouth empty of petals a funeral pyre drenched in blood because I touch it as I lie down he lights the torch and then the pyre my ashes sting in his eyes let it be the last time he suffers when the last of me seeps out of him and evaporates on his cheeks

I wake up and the world feel like it is ending.  This is fine, I tell myself. This is fine. Every breath is a sigh, every sigh is a scream, and every scream is a sign. And reality, as always, is a blur of fist-fights and broken teeth. The birds are screaming at us, but we’re too tired to notice their warnings.  Or maybe we do. Maybe we ignore them anyways. We’re spilling atlases in our sleep, pointing out forgotten cities and long lost empires, whispering, ‘here. here. my destination is here.’ A map without a key is useless, didn’t you know? It’s okay. I didn’t either. We were but children when ache became normalcy. The earth fractures when it realizes what we’ve become. Each fault line is an apology for all the faults we never forgave. If whole continents could break apart, then it’s only natural that our fragile bodies followed. Grief is the only language that has withstood the test of time. Grief and love. They are always intertwined, always chasing each other, always with us, like a crown that sits too heavy on the head. We should’ve placed it on our hearts instead. It would have held up better. I fall asleep and the world feels like it is ending. This is fine, I tell myself. This is fine.

I wonder if my heart seems like a motel. Sorry, that’s probably a weird thing to say. It’s just that, people always leave, you know? They always leave. It’s just that, I feel like I constantly have to put up the bright neon signs for 24 hours. All of them at full power, all of them saying, look at me, look at me, look at me. And as I write this, I hope you don’t leave when you see the ugliness of my craving and of my need. The ugliness of my human. It’s just that, my arms will always be open to hold a person’s hurt for them, but when they go away they forget to offer their homes in return. Sometimes they forget to take their burdens with them. Sometimes they don’t even leave a note goodbye. It's just that, when I look up at the crescent moon, I can't help but to ask, 'how you do deal with the fact that people only give you love when you are full?' No one ever remembers to grant the falling stars their wishes too. It's just that, at the end of the day, I am a room that people like to rent but never stay in.  It's just that, my hands want something warm to hold.

You're not destined or chosen, I wish I could tell you that you were if that would make it easier, but it's not true. You're in the right place at the right time, and you care enough to do what needs to be done. Sometimes that's enough.

Happy Jar post!