Lilac void

[inkskinned]

somewhere out there someone has probably used AI to write their wedding vows. someone out there is probably loading their hinge profile with AI quippy responses. when i close my eyes i picture a man hunting through chatGPT prompts, trying to get someone else to love him. maybe she sends him back chatGPT too, and two robots fall in love.

is this our new lives, then? is love scripted? i have a dandelion heart and some part of me wants to believe that AI will not obtain self-reliance by evil but instead by discovering the single perfect shape of love - the one thing humanity (in all our time and force) could never quite nail down. maybe it will be a string of numbers. the imprint of static, the universe's thumbprint. maybe it will just be a single long mirror, and jam dripping down your hands.

i know there are "good" reasons. i was nervous! or i was unsure how to say it! but - i want your nervous words. i want your unsure words. i want you to strike entire pages of work for me. i want you to gesture vaguely, to ransack your mind for ways to instead-of-saying just show me. i want to find where your words fail you and where the summer of your longing blazes out of you, infinite, resisting the capture of definition.

and i want to do the same for you. isn't any love worth a little bit of struggle? i want to shiver with the movie-ripe sense my friends are lovely and i am so tender towards them - i want to never quite be able to explain what it means to spend my life with them. i want to draw shapes on your skin that exit the geometric and fade into the same, wordless pattern. it is still love if silent. you know - i rarely, if ever, actually tell my siblings i love them? i just show up often, and hope the action does the talking.

i know AI is "easier". of course. buttoned up and seamlessly corporate. but i do not want to love you through a film. i do not want to love you with your edges sanded down. i cannot recognize myself in you if you are unmarred and glistening. something about how, with the crystal-clear mp3 files of the present, we ache for the scratch of vinyl. the flaws are what make love worth it. i want the raw and the windbeaten and the unkempt.

something tender, then. i love you because you're real, which means that you cannot be perfect.

[greelin]

something genuinely insane about going somewhere and getting to feel “i had some of the worst years of my life here” and “i was loved here, once” simultaneously.

[greelin]

the structure rots and the plants reclaim. But i remember

[demonprincex]

one of the trippiest things about unmasking ones autism/neurodiversity/insanity is that all selves are a mask, albeit to varying extents. the second you think you know who you are, it becomes a story you are telling yourself, and you will pressure yourself to align with it and ignore details to help make it fit. that is not to say the project of finding your self is pointless, simply that it never ends and it is the searching itself, the desire for the expression rather than the expression itself, that is you. and there are and will be many of those yous, and they will never stop changing. certain fictional selves we make (or that society foists upon us) certainly fit worse than others, but the ones that fit well are more like roles it's fun to sometimes play than they are anything static and certain. we are found in the becoming not in the being. in the search not the finding. you understand what im saying

[inkskinned]

i think probably magic is real.

the thing is that i was a teacher for a long time and sometimes i come back to this moment in the classroom where a 7 year old asked me are mermaids real? and i stared at her and had no idea how to answer.

for a really long time i just assumed that glow-in-the-dark paint/etc was a result of something made in a lab. i just recently found out that a specific mine in new jersey that just has rocks that do that naturally and it sent me for a loop about stuff.

because first of all - let's be honest, all of us: if there was going to be a naturally-occurring location for uv-activated glow-in-the-dark rocks? it would have to be in New Jersey. that's just the place that makes the most sense for that to happen. probably 10 thousand years ago cavemen were like. "oh this place is gonna be new jersey one day. this has new jersey energy."

the rocks only glow in the presence of uv light and are otherwise just normal rocks. in lord of the rings, there's a special sword that glows in the presence of orcs. it is magic, except that's a real thing that exists (and exists, as we have discussed, in new jersey, of all places). i guess maybe this implies orcs give off uv light.

yeah, okay. magic is just science. i know all the stuff about how ghosts are probably just caused by vibrating pipes. i knew about how there's a reason-for-all-of-this. but what do you mean that there's rocks that give you poison damage if you touch them. what do you mean that we live on the same planet as electric eels. what do you mean that a battery just, like - stores power?

and i don't know. in 20 years maybe they will find a mermaid but they will say something like well she's technically not a mermaid she's this other species, she has whiskers and not hair. and i will have to travel back in time and tell a 7 year old not technically, but there's something that is like a mermaid.

and she will look at me and think that what i am saying is science means magic isn't real and what i am actually saying is science is our word for why magic works. and then i will teach her about uv rocks, and new jersey. i will tell her to be a scientist, which is the same thing as being a wizard. there is probably a reason why sci-fi and fantasy are often grouped together. it is very lucky to be here, i think. if you squint, the improbability of it all - it does kind of feel like spellwork.

[slfcare]

I used to hate it when people said the trick was to just do it until ‘do it scared’ started going around, because that’s truly it. Life didn’t start changing until I applied for jobs with one hand in front of my eyes and a trembling hand navigating my computer mouse. Or until I said everything on my mind (in moderation) with my fists clenched and my legs weak. Or until I refused to accept that I’d ‘just’ be shy forever while also kind of being nauseous at the idea of trying to be the opposite. Two things can coexist and that’s exactly the point of believing that you can do anything.

[ashstfu]

someone said we had more fun in childhood because we didnt have any past memories to linger on and it has stuck with me ever since

[ashstfu]

[inkskinned]

crying because i call myself my dog's mom but i'm probably more like a sister to him and the way i love people is always spilling out over my hands in milk so yes i got told a lot you try too hard as a kid and i didn't know what that meant i just try to shove everything i care about under my wing and hold it there so every feather acts as an umbrella and if you're normal that's okay they'll say you're kind but if you're not normal it is a problem and someone who says they're an empath watched me fall down on the train and refused to give me the hand up

and yeah maybe i'm kind of bitter because every time i try to open up i only get to the bones of the thing before someone else takes up the whole room with meat and gristle and sparknotes of their own life painted in a pelt across my palms and just as i'm tryna clean up one mess another seems to pop up and it's really difficult to explain to your therapist that the problem is that you are too aware of the problem and that you keep fucking up and it's really difficult to explain to your partner i have no faith in the concept of love and life is a lot of sliding down these days, turn my body ice and moth, and that's okay! i am broken upside down like an egg and i am going to love you like an explosion and a star and a fucking galaxy! i'm gonna be too much

because god forbid you feel like me! god forbid you know what it's like! holy shit, god forbid. i'm gonna love you because i didn't get love. i'm gonna love you because otherwise the world is too cruel. i only live in the dark. maybe i'm a martyr. i think it's more like - i need to be right about this, about hope and trying and community. i'm going to be right about this, even if i need to set myself on fire to procure the warmth. come take it then, come latch on. i need you to be okay so someone is okay. so there's a reason i was born. i need it to work. i need to be shelter. a lighthouse. endlessly giving more.

i need to be. holy shit, god forbid. i can't live in a world that's only storm.

[cryptonature]

Once you realize that life is a thing that always ends

with unfinished goals, the question becomes,

"what do you want to spend your life pursuing,

completely divorced form the idea of catching it?"

[inkskinned]

i had a dream last night that you apologized. it was for real this time. my hands shook while i read it; waiting for you to do the thing you always do - chewing on my lip, i was waiting for you to make it about you. waiting for the part where everything shifts and suddenly - again! - i'm taking care of you.

it's never really your fault, something is always "happening" for you. you always have an excuse. it's hard to explain because my heart is too gentle. i keep finding reasons to forgive your repeated actions. i keep saying well, you didn't have it easy or that was a hard time or maybe i just upset you enough for that reaction. i talk about how i was a troubled kid once. i talk about how people stuck by me when i went dark. i give you what i never got.

i texted my siblings about it: you ever remember something and then get mad about it all over again. and still, that little voice inside my head - did i not explain myself explicitly enough? am i being unfair? the boundary i drew had been communicated, but what if i should have given more chances for you to get used to it?

i had a dream you finally saw things my way. that you said - i realized why you were hurting. i caused that. i'm sorry. i had a dream that i know i'm going to have to talk about in therapy.

you want to know the worst part? i would forgive you pretty much instantly. i would roll over and let you back into my life immediately. i would tell everyone that you've turned over a new leaf. i would defend you like an attorney. i'd say how you've been working hard and finally apologized to me. i'd tell them all that the bare-minimum from you was finally showing.

that's all it would take. a single, real i'm sorry. and it's knowing that you can't do it. it's knowing you will never, ever take responsibility.

[inkskinned]

it's just - the way you were, the way that you got, back then. the bad rush, the oil spill so high up your neck that your teeth swam in it. what you needed back then was a barn raising. what you needed back then was all-hands-on-deck.

it's just - you needed a village, is all. you needed your parents to actually just cool it for a second, because for one minute if you were very still, in the middle of the act of being roadkill: you could feel it. the edges of that sharp thing, the other-world, the promised land, the bird that was supposed to be born in your throat.

if you'd just - if any one person had just - noticed. maybe that would have been enough. you could have convinced your body to do a strange form of necromancy: you could have come back with the rope ladder. you were an emergency flare. you were morse code.

it's okay. come home again. us do-it-yourself undead, those of us who broke the book and still found our way out of the grave again. we never got the return flight. we never got the party. we just got up. we got up and then we kept going, because nobody else was gonna clean the mess. we might as well. we just... exist here, half-ghosts, barely-made it kids. no medals, except the strange serene rush of spreading jam on perfect toast. of moving a paintbrush. the silence that knows about the danger of sparks. the little candle of our heart not a stormbreaker or earthshaker. just the persistent lick of hope.

it is a quiet reward. we will not get the barn, but we do get each other. a night sky of little lights made from the gruesome survival of blood and bone. the life we made in the dark. a little somber radiance. a spellwork that's all our own.

in the end - despite it all, we built ourselves a home.

[ashstfu]

gripping my thighs with my nails about this written by @ryebreadgf

[t-hiswifey]

[hypergamiss]

I love this

[inkskinned]

i'm used to it, and how bad it is, and how often it's so bad that it rings like a bell inside of me, drowning out everything around me. and the truth is that i get frustrated with myself about it - again? we're like this still? again? it's not that i feel weak, precisely. it's just this sense almost like - i've already been pushing against this thing for years now, shouldn't i have gained more ground?

i get frustrated because i'm sick of picking up the loose ends every six months. i get frustrated because it's always this same shit, same problem - i lose myself in a matter of months; spiral out of control, lose touch with friends and loved ones. i stop taking care of myself and therapy gets hard and i let everything around me wilt and shrivel and fall off; start somehow both sleeping too much and not-enough. i panic-attack and cry in my car in a target parking lot, pulling my hair out and hurting my ribs from sobbing so hard - and later, when i'm better, i'm embarrassed because how could i let it get that far?

it feels like - i already have done this so many times. isn't there a way out of it? isn't there a point where i've just... won? that it never happens again, that i just get to be done? maybe this is weakness, i guess - that i still (so often!) succumb.

i am used to it, so i forget exactly how hard it gets. do you even know how many times i've laid in bed, exhausted, blank and numb and listless and said - i can't anymore. i just can't. i'm not even really upset. it's okay. i've been here long enough. so much of my life was beautiful.... i'm just... done.

do you know how many times i woke up and i said - i can't and put my feet on the floor and said i can't, i don't want to and took a shower and walked the dog and bought myself fresh bread and put a nice playlist on and said i really can't, there's no end to this and i went to work and i called a friend and i made myself cookies even if food tasted like ashes and decided that i really should wait for the new album from that artist i love and i thought i can't, it's not worth it and then i washed my hands and cut my hair and drank more water and wrote a poem and signed up for an art class at the local community college and said i can't, i can't, i won't do this again, and i paid my rent and let the dishes rot in the sink but still made myself eat anything fresh even if it meant overdrawing my account on a stupid bag of plums just because they looked delicious and do you know how often i closed my eyes and thought this is it i really fucking can't, something has to give and i have nothing left that it can take and then i went to bed and i got up and i fucking survived anyway

yesterday the local ice cream place opened up for the first time this season and they were giving out tiny samples of their new dairy-free options and i tried a mango sorbet. three months ago i was positive that februrary was going to be my last month on the planet. i am teaching my dog a new trick and i just discovered a new band i love. i got a plant from the clearance aisle and repotted her and she's been perking up. i made salmon for alison and we ate it in her new house with her new beautiful baby girl. my manager told me he keeps recommending my work to others just because i always include a stupid number of puns. tomorrow i'm trying a new dance class. tomorrow i'm maybe going to buy more plums.

i forget, you know? it's not some bone-deep strength or some magical power. it's that some part of me knows - i need to stay. in all of this; out of all of this - i just want to choose love.

[nosebleedclub]

What does your regret taste like?

[inkskinned]

i cheerfully tell people i'd rather regret saying yes than regret saying no.

this is a good rule of thumb when you have dug the grave. when you have shoveled entire years of your life into the mouth of mental illness. when you have watched your future dissolve, cotton candy in water, fizzling into mist. is there a way to quantify what exactly it took from me? the true amount (in pounds? ounces?) of what i missed.

so far from the earth, i saw my own body warping in this hideous fashion. how is it that someone can wear all that numb like an anvil and still go about their day? i would have let a tusk rip me hollow and still called myself stable. i wasn't an emergency, i was a fracture. the way ice cracks beneath snow. i deleted myself, turned my spirit into granules.

wayside child. standing by the side of the road, almost killed by the oncoming blow. mouth full of road rash and sand and bacitracin. mouth full of what never made it home. mouth full; body plucked chickenbone empty. like if you close your eyes you start feeling like you're falling.

someone asked me recently - would you rather live with your depression or your anxiety and without hesitating i said oh absolutely my anxiety. i know her, and she absolutely tries to kill me. she tears my hair out, rips all my nails off, makes me panicky and sick.

but depression stood there, her jaw so open, sticking her tongue out for the rain. she watched me, in the gutter, begging her for a hint of my life back. around me, splintered, were the other wonders i had gathered, gathering dust and gravedirt. she turned those yellow eyes at me so soberly and yet i still knew she was laughing. she toed them over into oblivion. mine, she said. mine, before they're yours.

to be sitting there, watching the world spiral so gloriously out ahead of me, the carrot before the donkey. to have it within my reach. to let it slip out of my fingers, almost happily. gently. to touch it without taking. nothing technically stopped me. if i had just gotten up, i could have eaten my fill. i sat at a banquet and starved and still felt like - ah. oh well.

blistering on the tarmac. never been hit, but already roadkill.

[inkskinned]

i have spent a few days listening to the music you like. you have a tattoo of the band's logo on your ribs. you got it when you were still kind of a kid. my first tattoo was a bird instead. i did the math - we got our first tattoos in the same calendar year. isn't that kind of cool.

my mom loves hallmark movies, so i grew up thinking love would look like a firework. it feels like one, after all. it's just that my house wasn't safe. i thought love was a weapon, could be pointed at your eyes. could lose a finger to it, or teeth. my father used to say passion is everything. i thought that meant constant fighting was a good thing. i thought that meant love looked like a week of bickering, because it was worth the the weekend's boombox apology. i thought quiet love was boring. i thought love had to blot out everything, compel the body and the mind like puppetry. i thought love looks like ruining your own dinner table - but at least you set a feast.

but love looks like a scarf. your hands smoothing it down my chest, being sure each of the edges are tucked in, worried about my asthma attacks being cold-activated. i race you while i'm wearing heels, you hold my hand to guide me downhill while walking my dog. we dance in my living room to waltz of the flowers, i show you how to hold your arms in proper ballet port de bras. you write a song about looking out of my window while the snow falls. i ask you to text my friends back while i'm driving. you play dj in the front seat. somewhere on route 93, we start murmuring about secret things.

oh. there is a difference between peace and dispassion. it was never that i feared quiet, it's that i didn't know what safe felt like. i liked the chaos because it was familiar, not because it was kind. i think i used to fear the word wife. i didn't like the idea of long, lonely days and being yelled at for small things. i didn't like the idea of sacrificing my one beautiful life.

you meet my friends and make a point to learn things about them. we both get excited about the other person's passions. you read my book for hours, squinting at the small words. i try to understand basic guitar information. we talk for four hours on the phone while i string together a garland. we talk for six hours while you write a poem. i save a pintrest tip for the summer about making paper kites. i plan us a week-long trip to maine, map out my favorite places for an eventual hike. you fall asleep on the ride home, and i turn down the radio so it won't wake you up. your quiet hands fold over mine.

when i look up, the stars are brighter. how carefully you've woven gold into the corners of my life. when i move, i feel some part of my soul reflected back onto you.

oh, love is not a net. it's a blanket.

[javarisx-fightingthosedemons]

[zerounwantedvibrations]