- a secret. i have been chasing golden drops of sun since i let go of my mother’s hand. since the tenth year. since the day i taught myself to drive around landmines and scribble a map into existence. i said, happiness is there, there, just out of reach.
and i was twelve when i caught one. (it tasted like chlorine and shampoo and freedom and disappointment.) there was a girl by the water and she looked pretty with her hair all wavy and wet and i thought, if i were a boy i would have liked to kiss her. but i was a girl. and i was a leaf in the wind when she swam away.
september walked in and i was bored in class when you passed me a note in neat handwriting: hi, you’re pretty. do you want to be friends? yes / no.
the taste of happiness, our english teacher said. she was waxing poetic, talking about twilights and dumplings, bubbles and laughter, forests and berries, roses and thorns
but i was thirteen and i was starting to forget what it tasted like. if i tried, i could recall medals and books and playtime and clouds. if i tried, i could taste iron, taste paper, taste the words i had to swallow to keep the peace. if i tried, i thought i could taste yes.
i thought i could taste sunsets.
so i searched for silver drops of moon after clawing my way out of the mud. after the seventeenth year. after telling myself to tear down the stop signs and turn the stupid, goddamn map into a torch. i said, happiness is there, you know, just in the night.
and i was nineteen when i reached for one. (it tasted like spicy shrimp and sellotape and blue birds and loneliness.) there were poems in my notes: where sea meets sky, my soul longs to know her the way lightning knows sin, the way treasure chests know gold, the way oceans know rain. i was saying, i am a girl and i would like to kiss her.
it is december of this cursed year and my hands are cold and i am cold but i stay beside you on the rooftop where our breaths are fairies moving with the wind.
the taste of happiness? you smile around your strawberry lollipop. you say, “i think it would taste like peaches.”
because we are twenty, trying to remember what it used to taste like. before ashes. before tears. before wishes. when i was a kid i think i tasted stars. now i think - maybe like honey. like cake. like ice cream. like lollipops. like my peach shine lip balm. like i love you. like, what else but you?
it is at the tip of my tongue. i swallow. say, “just between you and me, i think it would taste like strawberries.”
like a secret. like, who else but you, you, you.
amandla
turnnoffyourmind
kianamaiart
