Wandering Limerence

✍🏻 Kael Sora, Editor of Wandering Limerence 📚 I soak myself in slowburns, silences, and emotional moments.

[kaelsora]

For more kael sora immersion! ✨

Nothing beats a newsletter for full blown immersion: Substack

The Humanverse and other BL stories: Tapas

~kael

[kaelsora]

Is there a Xianxia story that has never left you?

For me it's Eternal Love 三生三世十里桃花. For what they understood about love and time.

Sharing the ending track from the Eternal Love cdrama here to relive the moments.

入夜漸微涼 繁花落地成霜 你在遠方眺望 耗盡所有暮光 不思量 自難相忘

Writing about why the story never left me here.

[kaelsora]

莊周夢蝶 Did a butterfly dream of me? 🦋

What if we are not humans dreaming of immortality,

but immortals briefly experiencing what it means to be human?

This question has intrigued me for a while.

The full piece is up here on Wandering Limerence if you want to sit with it too.

[kaelsora]

Devotion is not naive.

Devotion may seem naive.

But we cannot help ourselves, nor do we want to.

Talking all things Xianxia these few days.

Why We Cannot Let Go of Xianxia?

What immortal cultivators, endless lifetimes, and the pursuit of transcendence reveal about modern longing, love and pursuit.

[kaelsora]

Reliving my Xianxia in my mind 💭

Years after finishing a good Xianxia drama, I can find myself thinking about it.

I may love the epic battles and attaining new ranks.

But it’s the waiting, the devotion and the undying love that grabs me every time. Wrings my heart.

Writing about why we cannot let go.

Why We Cannot Let Go of Xianxia?

What immortal cultivators, endless lifetimes, and the pursuit of transcendence reveal about modern longing, love and pursuit.

[kaelsora]

Changing the magnitude of time 🕰️

Some says it takes 21 days to form a new habit.

How long does it take to hone a new skill?

In a world obsessed with speed and instant proof, Xianxia (仙侠) gives a completely different magnitude to time.

That's part of why it stays with us.

[kaelsora]

无可奈何. What a helpless feeling. 💔

You can be the most powerful cultivator in all the realms. You can cheat death and outlive dynasties.

But you cannot choose who you love. And you cannot guarantee that love will last as long as you do.

Is there any point to eternal life without eternal love?

[kaelsora]

“you’re coming too, right?”

he likes his bros and loud laughter and pulling people into orbit around him.

you like sitting alone in your studio making music at 2am.

and yet somehow, every single time, he still turns to you first and says:

“you’re coming too, right?” 🩵

~ kael

[kaelsora]

Unrecoverable

I send my heart across the sea, a whisper vanished through the summer breeze Your name still stirs the silent air, as though you are here, and not God knows where. The stars remember how I crave, witnessing it all, my wistful gaze. Still, I ache where words can’t go, a love out of reach, nothing left to hold. 🩵

[kaelsora]

“because of you, i no longer long to drift.”

something about that line quietly destroyed me.

not because it was dramatic.

because someone loved you enough that wandering stopped feeling necessary.

is it a hold? or is it hole that fileld?

wrote more about 防空洞 (air-raid shelter) as a metaphor for love on wandering limerence.

防空洞 | Air-raid shelter

Two Chinese songs. One air-raid shelter. Do you want a love that keeps you safe?

[kaelsora]

Oh, Love

some loves expand you.

some loves are the cave.

My new music essay 防空洞 is now on Substack.

防空洞 | Air-raid shelter

Two Chinese songs. One air-raid shelter. Do you want a love that keeps you safe?

~ Kael / Wandering Limerence

[kaelsora]

防空洞

防 = protect

空洞 = emptiness. hollow.

to protect the hollow.

isn't that what a lot of love really is?

not fixing you.

just sitting beside the emptiness so it doesn't swallow you whole.

~ kael / wandering limerence

[kaelsora]

The Emptiness in You Greets the Emptiness in Me

空的你，空的我。空空洞洞。 we are all emptied out.

Yet, we 相依为命。 Depending on each other to live.

no logic. no plans. just two people, slightly crazed, clinging to each other in the dark.

a disaster, probably. forever spring, definitely.

🎵 防空洞 essay about two Chinese songs, one shelter, one question about love. Read on Substack.

防空洞 | Air-raid shelter

Two Chinese songs. One air-raid shelter. Do you want a love that keeps you safe?

~ Kael / Wandering Limerence

[kaelsora]

love is also:

extroverts continuing to invite their introverted person everywhere without resentment.

just quietly making space for them in every future plan. 🩵

~ kael

[kaelsora]

防空洞. air-raid shelter.

two Chinese songs with completely different vibes used the same word to describe love.

I have been thinking about that for longer than I'd like to admit.

because what if love isn't what expands you?

what if sometimes, love is just the cave you crawl into. when it's snowing outside.

new essay on Substack.

防空洞 | Air-raid shelter

Two Chinese songs. One air-raid shelter. Do you want a love that keeps you safe?

~ Kael / Wandering Limerence

[kaelsora]

累了借你我的肩 when you're tired, borrow my shoulder

wrote this about the love that doesn't announce itself. quiet. certain. already all the way in.

🎵 走向前 (Move Forward). original C-pop lyrics by me, melody generated with AI. full song and essay on Substack.

走向前 (zǒu xiàng qián), Move Forward

Song drop. There’s a specific kind of love.

~ Kael / Wandering Limerence

[kaelsora]

走向前 (zǒu xiàng qián)，Move Forward

there's a specific kind of love this song is about.

not the falling. not the longing from across the room.

the already. the settled. the person who pulls you in front of them, so you block the sun. not because they planned to. just because that's who they are around you.

最好的風景是你我 the best scenery is you and me

new original C-pop on Substack. lyrics mine. melody AI-generated on Suno.

走向前 (zǒu xiàng qián), Move Forward

Song drop. There’s a specific kind of love.

~ Kael / Wandering Limerence